1 - it's not a missile. If I recall correctly, it's an air-laid mine (typically for harbor blockade)
2 - I used to have to get coffins that size and larger in and out of magazines with doors that narrow. Like Sarge said, you ease one corner in and play a kind of "parallel parking" game to scoot the load in the door.
3 - Nametapes, baseball hat, gut, hands in pockets...I'm pretty sure we're looking at Navy here. More than likely the entire "event" is sitting just that way because after pulling a stunt like that there will be an investigation, and these pictures may be part of that.
4 - I don't think the pavement in front of the coffin is torn up, that looks more like spall from the gouges that are now hidden in the ground.
5 - You can just see the lifting holes in the middle picture, and the "item" is still in place because it's strapped in by those two big shiny bands...
6 - I'm pretty sure this device is conventional, but even then handling accidents can and will set off ordnance. The fuses are installed and armed shortly before takeoff, but accidents happen...
During the height of Desert Storm I was moving a pallet of three 1,000 pound Mk 83 bombs. We were staging those near the front of the bomb dump, about 50 yards from the guard shack. As I rounded the corner, I noticed two things:
1- The guard shift was changing so I had an audience of about 20-30 Marines watching me.
2- The load was shifting.
All three bombs drifted out to the right, where I swear they hung in the air, taunting me to try to catch them. All I could do was watch them, knowing that if they detonated I would't know it. I did the only possible thing; I looked over at the collected Grunts, and yelled BOOM!! as loud as I could.
They sure hit the deck quickly...after the dust settled I set the pallet down and rolled the bombs back onto my forks one at a time and gently rolled them back onto the pallet.