WW2 bomb found in basement
|Published
File photo: Several streets were evacuated and cordoned off when the alarm was raised. File photo: Several streets were evacuated and cordoned off when the alarm was raised.
London - During the Blitz, they huddled in air raid shelters and relied on their famously indomitable East End spirit as the Luftwaffe bombs rained down.
And something of the same steeliness returned to Bethnal Green after more than 150 people were evacuated from their homes when a 500lb unexploded Second World War bomb was found in the basement of a three-storey mews by builders.
Several streets were evacuated and cordoned off when the alarm was raised, with Army bomb disposal experts called in to defuse the German device.
About 100 residents slept at a local school and were given pizzas while they waited for the all-clear. Bernard Lewis, 76, who remembers the Blitz, said: “We didn’t have that last time.”
The bomb was safely defused using a complex “chemical soak” process so it could be removed, and residents were allowed to return home.
An Army spokesperson said the device had been “potentially more dangerous today than the day it was made”.
John Biggs, Mayor of Tower Hamlets, said: “The East End has not got a reputation for being gusty without reason. They just put their heads down and get on with it around here.”
Dozens of unexploded bombs dropped during the Luftwaffe’s raids are buried beneath London.
Daily Mail