‘Hoax’ bomb latest oddity in Machias

MACHIAS – So far, 2008 has not been good for the peace and quiet of this coastal Washington County hub community.

Within the past few weeks, an Eastport man has been found frozen to death in a snowbank outside a local hospital; a deer has alarmed passers-by after jumping through a window at a downtown bank and then drowning in the nearby river; and just last week, two people were shot dead and a man was arrested on murder charges in an apparent domestic violence confrontation.

Then on Saturday, police cordoned off several downtown blocks for five hours after what appeared to be a pipe bomb was found in the snow on the side of Free Street.

About 35 to 40 people in a one-block radius were evacuated from their homes before local law enforcement officers, with help from a Maine State Police bomb squad, determined that the apparent bomb was in fact a “hoax,” according to Machias Police Chief Grady Dwelley. The device contained no explosives, he said.

Police are faced with the usual challenges that stem from such incidents, namely finding out where the fake bomb came from and whether anyone should face criminal charges. But for many people who live in and frequent Washington County’s shiretown, there is a more immediate question: What the heck is going on in Machias?

“The big talk is: Why is it happening all at once?” Dwelley said after Saturday’s incident. “I don’t know if you want to call it a phase of the moon or what.”

On Court Street, just around the corner from where the suspicious object was found, it was business as usual Saturday morning at Porter Memorial Library, which remained open throughout the scare. But life lately in Machias has been anything but business as usual, according to assistant librarian Dawn Rensema.

“This is not par for the course up here,” she said between helping patrons. “I think it will [return to normal]. You know how things kind of build and then settle down again.”

“It’s been a wild month,” library director Kathy Burke added. “It seems to happen in threes.”

Sharon Dexter, owner of a retail store and a real estate business nearby on Broadway Street, suggested Saturday that the cold snowy winter and the state of society in general could be factors in the recent local chain of events. The apparent pipe bomb, which turned out to be empty, could have been an adolescent prank, she said.

“There’s been a lot of stuff happening around here,” she said. “They’re going stir crazy. It’s not easy to be locked in all winter.”

Too often, children are not getting the support and supervision they need at home, Dexter said. High oil and gas prices and Washington County’s notoriously struggling economy likely are creating stress for area residents, she speculated.

“I don’t know what’s going on in our sleepy little town,” she said. “I just think it’s a damn hard winter here.”

As for the bomb scare, police said the device was found lying in the snow by the side of Free Street around 7:30 a.m. by a Washington County Jail corrections officer who was walking home from work. Police were notified, and after they determined it might be dangerous, they cordoned off the block and waited for a Maine State Police bomb-response team to arrive from Augusta.

Members of the bomb squad, bringing a specialized robot with them, arrived around 11 a.m. They unloaded the wheeled robot and then remotely maneuvered it across a parking lot to examine the apparent bomb, which Dwelley said was a chrome piece of pipe about 9 inches long that had been capped on either end. Some type of cord or string resembling a fuse was sticking out of one end, he said, leading police to think it might be rigged to explode.

Police then put a special shotgun attachment on the robot and used it to blast a hole in the device, which Dwelley said was meant to disable it without actually making it explode. But it turned out the pipe was empty.

“This turned out not to be serious [in terms of actual danger], but it is serious,” the chief said.

Considering everything else that has happened, he said, it was good that Saturday’s incident did not result in anyone being hurt or in any damage, aside from people’s lives being disrupted for a few hours.

“All’s well that ends well,” Dwelley said.

btrotter@bangordailynews.net

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