Land mine discovered in Forsyth is decades old, mayor says. Here’s what it was used for

An employee at the Forsyth Golf Club found more than golf balls Tuesday in a wooded area near the entrance on Country Club Drive.

The suspicious-looking device was described as a canister-like item with “some type of trigger device on top,” Mayor Eric Wilson told The Telegraph.

The employee who made the startling discovery shortly after noon called 911, prompting responses from Monroe County Emergency Services, the Forsyth fire and police departments, the GBI bomb squad and the Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit of the U.S. Air Force.

The National Guard Armory, close to the course, reported the object did not appear to be anything it used or anything that was a part of its inventory, Wilson said.

The Air Force and GBI used a robot to assess and X-ray the unknown object.

Though the object had not yet been identified, officials rendered it safe and the scene was cleared shortly before 4 p.m.

“I think it was filled with plastic,” said Wilson, who waited in the nearby park for updates while crews inspected the device. “It wasn’t an explosive, but it was what they reckon to be a training land mine that dates back to the World War I or World War II era.”

The device is now in the possession of the the U.S. Air Force Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit.

This story was originally published October 2, 2019 at 4:58 PM.