The Army Navy Store in Pinellas was evacuated Monday after someone brought in a mortar round they found in a backyard.

An employee, Travis Teal, realized the round was live and evacuated the store. He said he placed the mortar behind the store while they waited for the bomb squad to arrive.

"I took it out back and walked it around to the back of the store and set it down,” he said. “That way if it did go off it was just going to blow the back half of my building, not the whole front of the store off."

Teal said the customer told him he found the mortar while installing cable at a home in St. Petersburg over the weekend.

Teal said he could tell it was live because he did three tours in Afghanistan with the Army.

The Tampa Bomb Squad says the mortar turned out to be a live practice round and it's now in MacDill's possession.