Father and son find grenade while magnet fishing in River Medway

Transcript

00:00Most people think of fishing as a relaxing pastime, but for one family

00:04their fishing hobby meant the police and the army had to get involved.

00:08Chris Homden and his son Leighton started magnet fishing around four years ago,

00:12throwing a powerful magnet into rivers and dragging it along the bed to see

00:17what they could find. And for the most part that would be small pieces of

00:21metal, parts of bicycles, or shopping trolleys. So when they discovered

00:25something so rusted they couldn't even tell what it was yet, they were pretty

00:29excited. Well at first we we was quite shocked to what it was and obviously the

00:36debris where it had been down there for so long. And even my son made a

00:40joke of it, oh it could be a grenade and I thought nothing of it. So we pulled it

00:45up and we kept it and kept it to the side and made sure everything was in a

00:51bag and then decided to take it home. But when Chris got home and cleaned the

00:54find, he recognized the raised pattern and manufacturers initials of a World

00:59War two grenade. He called the police who had to turn off their radios so not to

01:03interfere with the grenade. They then called the army who took the explosive

01:07into a nearby field to safely detonate it. Not something you really expect on a

01:12Sunday evening. Very exciting. Turns more frightening when we heard on my back

01:19camera into the garden the army state that it was live. That's when it became a

01:26little bit more frightening than exciting. But yeah, not something you really expect to

01:31happen every day. While the family were scared on that Sunday evening they still

01:35enjoy magnet fishing as it helps Leighton with the stresses of school and

01:39daily life as he has autism and ADHD. Chris asked if I wanted to give magnet

01:43fishing a try and although I'd never been I didn't think it'd be too

01:47difficult.

01:51Did that even touch the water?

02:02There we go.

02:08Nothing. Well, that's a lesson. You can't just pick up magnet fishing and get a

02:12grenade on your first try so you've got to work at it. Well, after

02:15finally actually getting the magnet into the water I still didn't have

02:19anything to show for my efforts, much less a grenade. Finn McDermid for KMTV

02:23in Aylesford.