Guardrails appear sabotaged to impale

[emad]

SENDAI (Kyodo) Sharp metal objects, some as long as 10 cm, have been found protruding from highway guardrails at about 600 locations in nine prefectures, central and prefectural government officials said Thursday.

A steel point was found Thursday, protruding from a guardrail along a prefectural road in Ishimaki, Miyagi Prefecture. MIYAGI PREFECTURAL GOVERNMENT PHOTO/KYODO

The sharp objects were found embedded in guardrails at about 450 points in six Tohoku region prefectures -- Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Akita, Yamagata and Fukushima -- and in Niigata and Ishikawa prefectures. The metal objects were also discovered at roughly 150 sites in Saitama Prefecture.

So far one injury has been reported. A 12-year-old boy suffered a scratched left leg Friday from a piece of metal in Gyoda, Saitama Prefecture.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20050603a2.htm