{"id":13654,"date":"2025-10-20T04:29:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-20T04:29:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/13654\/"},"modified":"2025-10-20T04:29:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-20T04:29:09","slug":"marine-corps-shrapnel-hit-patrol-car-on-california-freeway-during-demonstration-chp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/13654\/","title":{"rendered":"Marine Corps shrapnel hit patrol car on California freeway during demonstration: CHP"},"content":{"rendered":"

Shrapnel from artillery rounds fired by the U.S. Marine Corps during a celebration in front of Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth detonated prematurely and struck a patrol car, the California Highway Patrol said.<\/p>\n

The artillery rounds were fired over Interstate 5 near Camp Pendleton in San Diego County as part of a military demonstration for the Marine Corps’ 250th\u00a0anniversary.<\/p>\n

The live fire demonstration also coincided with \u201cNo Kings\u201d protests<\/a> against President Donald Trump and his administration that were occurring around Southern California and across the country.<\/p>\n

\"Mario<\/p>\n

Mario Tama\/Getty Images – PHOTO: Vice President JD Vance Leads The United States Marine Corps’ 250th Celebration<\/p>\n

A 17-mile stretch of the busy freeway that connects Los Angeles to San Diego was shut down during the event by the California Highway Patrol. The stretch of freeway is typically used by over 80,000 people every day, according to the agency.<\/p>\n

California Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s office said it was notified by the federal government Saturday morning that the military planned to shoot live artillery over the heavily traveled freeway, prompting highway patrol officers to temporarily close the freeway.<\/p>\n

Trump directs generals to defend US from ‘war from within’<\/a><\/p>\n

Last week, the military said that mortar rounds would not be fired over the freeway and said no freeways or roads would be impacted by the event.\u00a0Military officials said all activities would be strictly confined to training fields at Camp Pendleton and would not impact public areas.<\/p>\n

But on Saturday morning, the federal government requested that the state change electronic highway signs to read \u201cLIVE WEAPONS OVER FREEWAY,\u201d according to the California Highway Patrol.<\/p>\n

\"Mario<\/p>\n

Mario Tama\/Getty Images – PHOTO: Vice President JD Vance Leads The United States Marine Corps’ 250th Celebration<\/p>\n

Freeway signs all around Southern California warned drivers that live fire was in the vicinity of the freeway around Camp Pendleton.<\/p>\n

ABC News has reached out to the Marine Corps, Camp Pendleton and the Trump administration for a comment.<\/p>\n

For hours on Saturday, drivers in Southern California were stuck in gridlock on the freeway or had to take lengthy detours.<\/p>\n

During that time, shrapnel allegedly rained down on the freeway in the closure zone, according to CHP.<\/p>\n

\"California<\/p>\n

California Highway Patrol – PHOTO: Shrapnel from artillery rounds fired by the U.S. Marine Corps during a celebration in front of Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth detonated prematurely and struck a patrol car, the California Highway Patrol said.<\/p>\n

In a police report obtained by ABC News, CHP says a patrol SUV was struck with shrapnel.\u00a0That SUV had \u201can approximate two-inch by half-inch piece of shrapnel on the hood of the patrol vehicle,” according to the report.<\/p>\n

The agency says in the report that the shrapnel made a dent in the hood.<\/p>\n

Additionally, patrol officers stated an officer working the freeway closure heard “what sounded like ‘pebbles’ falling on his CHP BMW motorcycle.”<\/p>\n

\"California<\/p>\n

California Highway Patrol – PHOTO: Shrapnel from artillery rounds fired by the U.S. Marine Corps during a celebration in front of Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth detonated prematurely and struck a patrol car, the California Highway Patrol said.<\/p>\n

CHP says it immediately alerted the Marine Corps that a mortar round did not clear Interstate 5 and that shrapnel was falling around the freeway.\u00a0 At that point, the Marine Corps, according to the CHP, immediately cancelled firing additional live ordinance over the freeway.<\/p>\n

A safety sweep was conducted on the freeway to look for more shrapnel, but none was found.<\/p>\n

Camp Pendleton officials told Fox News Digital that an investigation has been initiated to determine the incident\u2019s root cause.\u00a0“The demonstration went through a rigorous safety evaluation, and deliberate layers of redundancy, to ensure the safety of fellow citizens,\u201d the statement to Fox reads in part.<\/p>\n

Hegseth rails against ‘woke,’ lays out standards in speech to top generals, admirals<\/a><\/p>\n

In response to the apparent premature detonation and the firing of ordnances over the freeway, Newsom wrote on X on Sunday, \u201cWe love our Marines and owe a debt of gratitude to Camp Pendleton, but next time, the Vice President and the White House shouldn\u2019t be so reckless with people\u2019s lives for their vanity projects.\u201d<\/p>\n

The California Highway Patrol said it is requesting an after-action review with the federal government to discuss public safety.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shrapnel from artillery rounds fired by the U.S. Marine Corps during a celebration in front of Vice President…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13655,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,859,8,7338,12231,7716,2803,1009,12232,9872,10888],"class_list":["post-13654","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-highway-patrol","tag-california-news","tag-camp-pendleton","tag-patrol-car","tag-pete-hegseth","tag-president-donald-trump","tag-southern-california","tag-the-marine-corps-250th-anniversary","tag-u-s-marine-corps","tag-vice-president-jd-vance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13654"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13654\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}