A family’s summer’s day out by a river in south London took a sinister turn when they fished out an Uzi submachine gun and up to 10 other firearms that had been dumped in the water.
The shocking discovery was made on Saturday when Ryan Ball, 32, took his three children – 11, five, and one – to River Pool at Linear Park, between Catford and Sydenham.
His son’s friend James White stumbled upon a metal object at the bottom of the river while taking a dip to cool off. When it was pulled out, they realised that it was a magazine that would have contained bullets.
This finding triggered a more thorough search that resulted in the discovery of a cache of up to 11 guns, including the Uzi and a revolver.
There were also other guns that had been disassembled before being dumped in the water, as well as items that have been described as potential “explosives”.
At least 10 magazines and a number of individual bullets were also collected from the water.
Mr Ball said: “We were at river view walk where we regularly go with our children, and my sons were playing with a 15-year-old boy, James, when he slipped on what appeared to be a magazine from a gun.
“He then started to search around in the water, and then one after the other he started to pull out everything you can see in the pictures.
“I then contacted the police, who came and retrieved the weapons and will be sweeping the river for any more.”
Speaking to MyLondon, James said he “wished it was a bad dream”, adding that he feared at the time of finding a “cone-shaped” metal object that “it might be an explosive”.
After the weapons and ammunition were found, police were called to the scene in the early evening.
A spokesman for Metropolitan Police said: “Police were called to Winsford Road, SE6, at 16.49hrs on Saturday, 6 August to reports of firearms found in a river. Officers attended.
“A firearm and ammunition were recovered and removed from the scene.”
