Palm Springs roads reopen after pipe bombs detonated

Palm Springs police are investigating the discovery of three suspicious devices found along San Rafael Drive on Thursday morning, said Sgt. Mike Kovaleff.

The same person — a 91-year-old man — who found a similar device on Wednesday called police around 8 a.m. Thursday to report he had found another device near the intersection of Indian Canyon Drive and East San Rafael Drive.

Officers arrived and searched the area, where they found two more.

All of them were approximately six inches long, one was made of PVC piping, and the other was made of metal.

The Riverside County sheriff’s hazardous device team detonated the objects, allowing police to reopen the roadways just before 2 p.m.

Kovaleff said this is the same area where the same man found a pipe bomb Tuesday, which his son took to the police department on Wednesday, which forced an evacuation of the station, the bomb squad called and the device detonated on the front lawn.

No one was injured.

The man and his son have been cooperative with authorities and have not been arrested or charged with any crime, he said.

“If someone finds a suspicious object, it should not be touched or disturbed,” Kovaleff said. “Whoever finds it should leave the area and call 911 using a land line, since cellphone transmissions have the potential to detonate an explosive device.”

Police are now investigating where the devices came from.

If you have any information, call the Palm Springs Police Department or Crime Stoppers at 760-341-STOP.