Streetsboro Police are investigating the illegal detonation of explosive devices on four separate nights at Trail Lake Park in Streetsboro.

On Friday, August 9, Officer Matthew Martinez responded to a complaint of explosions being heard coming from a home on Ravenna Road around 11:09 p.m. The person said they heard an explosion on four different nights, each time around 11:09 p.m.

After an initial investigation, police discovered “remains of several plastic containers” in the Trail Lake Park parking lot, as well as an “intact plastic jug filled with an unknown liquid,” according to a Streetsboro police report obtained by The Portager. Although two incident reports were filed, only one was released.

Cotton swabs containing the unknown substance were also found at the crime scene. All evidence has been sent to the BCI lab for testing, although Chief Tricia Wain is unsure when the results will be available.

“I know when we take things to the regular lab, sometimes we get results within a week,” Wain said. “Sometimes we don’t get lab results for two months. It just depends on how busy the lab is and where we are in the hierarchy of importance.”

Wain currently believes it was a bomb made from materials readily available at any hardware store.

“It looks like a Drano bomb, but we’re not bomb experts, so the lab has to tell us what it’s made of,” Wain said. “The best we can describe is a Drano bomb, which unfortunately is pretty easy to build.”

The unexploded homemade bombs left at the scene could have posed a danger to park visitors or first responders.

“Two of the containers were left behind and did not explode,” Wain said. “That’s a safety hazard for all first responders and any park visitors who may have encountered it later. All it takes is for someone to pick something up and shake it wrong or move it wrong and something explodes in their hands. They were just really lucky that no one was hurt and they were not hurt themselves.”

Wain believes the detonation of these bombs could fall into the category of illegal possession of dangerous munitions, but there are currently no suspects in this case, she said.

Police are unsure if the bombings are limited to Trail Lake Park, but Wain is urging anyone who observes suspicious activity in the park to report it to Streetsboro police or, if the activity is outside of town, to the Portage County Sheriff’s Office.

“They’ve been pretty lucky so far,” Wain said. “We just hope no one gets hurt in the meantime.”