On Wednesday morning (30 August 2023) as staff and volunteers were sorting through donations at St Luke’s CARES cgarity shop on Dewsbury Road they discovered ancient hand grenade amongst a box of plates. The items had been collected from the Reuse container at the Pudsey Recycling site.
Unsure as to what state the hand grenade was in the police were called, two vans arrived quickly and shut the shop. Staff and volunteers left the premises and the building was secured. After the local police looked at the grenade they decided they needed to call in a specialist bomb disposal unit who travelled down from South Shields (near Newcastle) to deal with the situation.
The specialist Ministry of Defence unit took the hand grenade away to detonate it and the shop was able to open again for the final couple of hours of the day. Certainly not the usual happenings of a Wednesday at the charity shop!
Staff and volunteers at St Luke’s CARES are doing a fundraiser next weekend (9 September) walking the Yorkshire Three Peaks to help towards the costs of delivering the work we do in the local area, such as RISE, The Shine Project and the First Steps retail/ESOL training courses at the charity shop.
As a charity we’re committed to the South Leeds area and the people here, we’re passionate about our community and running different community projects and initiatives to see our community and the people in it thrive. Needing to shut the shop for a day due to the hand grenade was a bit of a blow (excuse the pun!) and has meant a loss of a day trading, income which usually goes towards running costs of these various projects.
So any donations to keep us walking next weekend would be greatly appreciated! To donate click here.
This post was written by Kate Singleton
Main photo: the bomb disposal team arrive at the Dewsbury Road shop (Credit: St Luke’s CARES)
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