Army Assists in Leesburg After Anti-Tank Missiles Found

About 100 Leesburg residents were evacuated from a 400-square-yard area of town Saturday after a resident found anti-tank missiles in a shed on her property, according reports Saturday night. Before the incident was over, investigators with the U.S. Army were called in to assist.

Loudoun County Fire, Rescue and Emergency Management Battalion Chief James Williams and Leesburg Mayor Kristen Umstattd spoke with WUSA 9 CBS News Saturday night to explain what happened.

“At about 1:30 p.m., Leesburg and Loudoun County Bomb Squad personnel were notified of an unknown device here in a residence in Leesburg,” Williams said. “They were Desert Storm-era anti-tank devices.”

Exactly how the devices came to be in a Leesburg residence remains under investigation.

“Nobody know that,” Umstattd said. “It’s possible they had been in that shed in someone’s backyard for years and years. She had never taken a look in the shed until she was about to go on vacation and decided to do some cleaning and this is what came up.”

Williams said the U.S. Army became involved between 3 p.m. and 4 p.m. He confirmed that the fuses were detonated and the devices were taken away.

Umstattd said a smaller area was initially evacuated, but they it was expanded “and eventually got about 100 folks out of their homes. We’re just relieved that the coordination between the county’s fire, rescue and emergency management and the town police was so good.”