We reported here that there are at least eight rocket launchers circulating somewhere in Australia that the police and the Defence Department are trying to track down.
But one rocket launcher has turned up in Queensland.
It was on sale. For $2. At a rubbish tip.
The rocket launcher was brought by a man who works in a local theatre, who thought it would make a great stage prop.
Once he saw a newspaper story about the missing rocket launchers, he called the police...Sorry, he delivered it to his local newspaper.
Why?
The media stories didn't explain.
The rocket launcher found in the tip was reportedly a Matador anti-armour model, developed by Singapore, to be used once and then....thrown on a rubbish tip.
From the Sydney Morning Herald :
He gave the weapon to a reporter from Rockhampton's The Morning Bulletin, who kept if for a number of days to photograph it and write a story.
"The police rang me earlier this evening and they told me they didn't know where it was so I redirected them back to the reporter," Mr Maloney said earlier this week, adding that the last time he saw the weapon was in the back seat of the reporter's car.
The reporter handed it in at Yapoon police station...
"It's sitting right in front of me at the moment. I'm sitting here trying to deal with it," said Senior Constable Vicky Lees.
"It's not dangerous at all ... unless you have some sort of explosive to fire it off..."
A Defence Department spokesman said the matter was under investigation.The spokesman also said it would be "unusual" for used military ordinance to be dumped at a public tip.
Unuusal, but obviously not unlikely.
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