Pipe Bomb Endangers School’s Swim Team but Fails to Explode

ORANGE —  Clay Kaytis was swimming laps with the rest of the Orange High School swim team early Friday morning when he noticed a small, dark object on the bottom of the pool.

Curious, the 16-year-old swam down to examine the object.

What he brought to the surface was a container wrapped in black electrician’s tape with a red fuse.

“It looked like a bomb,” Kaytis said.

It was a bomb.

Kaytis carried it to his coach, Charles Fisher, who told somebody to call the police, then took the device to an isolated spot in the student parking lot.

For the next 90 minutes, surrounding streets were closed and nearby classes canceled as the Sheriff’s Department bomb squad worked to defuse what deputies called a “very lethal explosive.”

The fuse had been lit, authorities said, but for some reason it did not explode, even though it was equipped to detonate in the water.

“Whenever you have a pipe bomb, and you don’t know who made it, the quality of it is suspect,” Orange Police Sgt. Art Romo said.

He also said Kaytis and Fisher had placed themselves “in great danger” by handling the device.

Sheriff’s Sgt. Charles Stumph, supervisor of the bomb squad, said his unit has gone out on more than 85 bomb calls so far this year, 22 of which involved homemade bombs.

“We’ve been very active lately,” he said, adding that most pipe bombs they encounter are traced to teen-agers. “It seems that most of these kids are experimenting.”

On Jan. 31, a student at Loara High School in Anaheim found a pipe bomb as he was walking across the school’s football field.

Pipe bombs are lethal because fragments from the pipes shoot through the air “faster than a bullet,” Stumph said.

Kaytis, who was dubbed a hero by several classmates, admitted that he was a little shaken up after he learned that the object was a real bomb.

“I could have lost an arm or something,” he said.

School officials and police said they have no idea who put the bomb in the pool. “It’s hard to understand who would want to do a thing like this,” said Shirley Fox, Orange High’s principal.