3 children hurt in Army camp blast in Abra
BAGUIO CITY—Three children were hurt when they stumbled on a fragment of a spent grenade that blew up at the firing range of a military camp in Lagangilang, Abra province, on Saturday, a belated report said.
The children, aged 9, 10, 11, were treated for minor wounds and were back at the camp of the Army’s 24th Infantry Battalion in Lagangilang, said its commander, Col. Thomas Baluga.
Two of them were children of a soldier who brought his family to celebrate the Christmas holidays in the camp, Baluga said. The third victim was the child of a civilian staying in the camp.
“I take responsibility for that accident. The children should not have been allowed to loiter around the firing range where we discharge weapons like grenade launchers,” Baluga said.
“The children were foraging for metal scraps and found the bottom of a spent grenade. They threw it and it exploded. The children were hit by small stones and gravel. All that was ignited was the [blasting] powder,” he said. RAM/rga
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