Overview
- Lifeguards found an unexploded munition on Mugu Beach that washed up Sunday and alerted the Ventura County Sheriff's Office.
- The county bomb squad inspected the device, the U.S. Navy identified it as naval ordnance, and technicians detonated it in a sand-filled hole on the beach.
- Officials said the item was a 1950s-era "super bazooka" round about a foot long and shaped like a football and that it remained dangerous despite decades in the water.
- Authorities noted this was roughly the 10th similar find in recent years on the same shoreline and said erosion and changing tides are increasingly exposing buried munitions.
- The beach was evacuated, a short stretch of Pacific Coast Highway was briefly closed, deputies stayed for hours to secure and clean the site, and the public was urged to leave suspicious objects alone and call 911.