Rocket Launcher Was Plastic Fake
Students at P.S. 68 on the Ridgewood/Glendale border were briefly forced to evacuate from their schoolhouse on Monday morning, Apr. 30, after a device that appeared to be a rocket launcher was found lying against a nearby telephone pole, authorities said.
Members of the 104th Precinct and the NYPD Bomb Squad responded to the incident at around 7:45 a.m. outside the school located at 59-09 St. Felix Ave.
Upon further investigation, police determined that the device was actually a piece of PVC piping with wires attached, painted in camouflage colors with the words “US Marines” written on the exterior.
One police source compared the contraption to a “spud gun,” an air cannon typically used to fire potatoes, not explosive devices.
Law enforcement sources said that Bomb Squad members brought the device to the NYPD shooting range in the Bronx; the phony weapon was deemed inoperable following testing.
