The United States has repeatedly used live ammunition during training, but according to one American official more than seventy years have passed since the Marine Corps fired artillery over a section of Interstate 5 in California – and that is how it happened during the celebration of the Marine Corps’ 250th anniversary on Saturday.
The first shell fired during the demonstration flew over the interstate, one of the busiest roads in the United States, and at least one fragment fell onto a parked patrol car of the California Highway Patrol. The celebration at Camp Pendleton in California was attended by Vice President J. D. Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
The U.S. Marine Corps is now investigating what went wrong with the 155 mm shell fired from the M777 howitzer. On the eve, Marines successfully fired more than two dozen rounds from the same series, which calls into question what happened on Saturday and why.
CNN reported that there were no injuries, which was confirmed by Tony Coronado, head of the California Highway Patrol’s Border Division.
The Marine Corps did not respond to questions about who decided to shoot over I‑5, when the last time the Corps fired artillery over an interstate, or whether there were broader questions about the series of ammunition from which the shell came.
Consequences and official responses
In the United States, 155 mm ammunition production is ramping up: since 2022 production has more than tripled and now reaches about 40,000 rounds per month, despite the opening of new manufacturing capacities under a $5.5 billion investment. A significant boost to growth came from Ukraine’s need for these shells in a prolonged war with Russia; the United States has already shipped over 3 million 155‑mm rounds since the start of the conflict.
California Governor Gavin Newsom, who had escalated the dispute with the White House over the safety of Saturday’s demonstration, said the road would be closed before carrying out the mission that involved firing from the beach over the highway onto the Camp Pendleton military base.
After Newsom described the plans to shoot over the highway as “indisputable” and said he had decided to close the highway, the vice president’s spokesperson Tony Coronado told CNN that the show was “a staged safe practice”.
Live-fire training with real ammunition is a common practice for US military units across the country. However, the highway chosen for Saturday’s event had hardly been used since Interstate 5 became an interstate in the 1950s, according to an official.
«Shooting from the beach, shooting over I‑5 – theoretically this should not have posed any problems»
«The shells were well above I‑5 at the moment of passing, and that is why the Corps evidently said that closing the road was unnecessary – because, in theory, they were high enough not to interfere with anyone below»
A photo of one of the fragments on the patrol car was provided in a press release by the California Highway Patrol; it stated that the shrapnel struck and damaged the patrol vehicle. Cancian stressed that the patrol car was not “hit” by the shell, but fragments from the shell that exploded high in the air fell onto the vehicle.
«It exploded very high, the fragments reached the ground, they did not appear to be moving very fast», he said, adding: «of course, this should not have happened».
