{"id":526952,"date":"2026-07-15T07:45:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T07:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/526952\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T07:45:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T07:45:09","slug":"ordnance-discovered-by-whangarei-12-year-old-safely-detonated-at-orewa-beach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/526952\/","title":{"rendered":"Ordnance discovered by Whang\u0101rei 12-year-old safely detonated at \u014crewa Beach"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cMy parents live in \u014crewa. We had some cousins visiting from Australia, so we were just down there enjoying the beach, and my younger two were climbing on the rocks,\u201d Teresa said. <\/p>\n

She said that as her eldest was climbing, she noticed something jammed deep into the rocks.<\/p>\n

Sophia told the Herald she originally thought it was a \u201cpiece of rubbish\u201d. <\/p>\n

At first glance, the cylinder appeared small, but upon closer inspection, it was about 40cm long and ran deep into the rock wall. <\/p>\n

\"TeresaTeresa Walker, said her 12-year-old daughter, Sophia Walker, made the startling discovery on a family holiday to the beach.<\/p>\n

The confused family took a photo of the metal object with red Spanish writing on it in the bid to figure out what it was. <\/p>\n

After doing a reverse image search, they discovered the item could have been an expended flare, a marine location marker or \u201csomething potentially explosive\u201d. <\/p>\n

The translation of the writing on the object said: \u201cDo not touch, contains phosphorus, notify police or military\u201d. <\/p>\n

Teresa\u2019s sister, Dana Marcroft, said the translation was a \u201cbit alarming\u201d. Sophia said she was \u201ckind of\u201d scared at the time. <\/p>\n

The family quickly moved away, didn\u2019t touch it, and Marcroft alerted police. <\/p>\n

Police told them they could not attend straight away. The tide had come in and covered the rocks, so the police came back the following morning. <\/p>\n

Police called Marcroft at 9.30am, and she helped them pinpoint the exact location of the device. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt takes the eagle eyes of a 12-year-old to spot something like that. <\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s [Sophia] going to have something very cool to write about at the start of term three,\u201d Marcroft joked. <\/p>\n

\"TheThe piece of ordnance was found on the rocks yesterday, near a playground on \u014crewa Beach.<\/p>\n

\u2018Loud bang\u2019<\/p>\n

Police said they were at \u014crewa Beach today and the NZDF Explosive Ordnance Disposal Team was called in to dispose of the item.<\/p>\n

Police confirmed it was detonated about 11.30am. <\/p>\n

Residents and pedestrians along Marine Parade were warned to expect a \u201cloud bang\u201d. <\/p>\n

Police said they would remain in the area and maintain a safe perimeter.<\/p>\n

There was no risk to public safety.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cMy parents live in \u014crewa. We had some cousins visiting from Australia, so we were just down there…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":526953,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[13502,1975,51,7972,3595,50641,14167,212658,260496,14647,2026,6043,1874,6868,1553,9933,1362,111,43,139,529,69,260495,10903,43923,4204,96261,27043,1552,1869,1316,5977],"class_list":["post-526952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-12yearold","tag-at","tag-auckland","tag-beach","tag-by","tag-controlled","tag-destroyed","tag-detonated","tag-detonation","tag-discovered","tag-discovery","tag-exploring","tag-found","tag-girl","tag-item","tag-later","tag-made","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-north","tag-nz","tag-ordnance","tag-popular","tag-rewa","tag-rocks","tag-safely","tag-shocking","tag-suspicious","tag-whangrei","tag-when","tag-which"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=526952"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526952\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/526953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=526952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=526952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=526952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}