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Danger over: ‘Dynamite’ boxes were empty

UPDATED: A bomb scare led police to evacuate a school and kindergarten in a small town south of Oslo on Wednesday, but it turned out be a false alarm.

Published: 11 March 2015 12:58 CET
Danger over: 'Dynamite' boxes were empty
People were evacuated on Wednesday from Dammyr housing estate and the Våk school in Våler in Østfold. Photo: Joakim Bekkåsen/Moss Avis/NTB scanpix
Twelve police armed with submachine guns raided a house less than 20km away, arresting a man in his forties, in an operation police confirmed was linked to the explosives discovery. 
 
But police removed the cordons in Rygge on Wednesday afternoon after discovering that boxes found outside a house and labeled as dynamite were in fact empty. 
 
The 56 students at Våk nursery school in the town of Våler i Østfold were evacuated at 12.30pm on Wednesday. Meanwhile, the 180 students at the next-door primary school were asked to go on foot to a nearby shop, where they could wait for their parents.
 
A specialist bomb disposal unit was sent from Oslo to defuse the would-be explosives. 

 
 

 
 

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WWII bomb found in Frankfurt safely detonated after mass evacuation

A massive World War II bomb found in Germany's financial capital Frankfurt was safely detonated in the early hours of Thursday, the city's fire service said, allowing tens of thousands of evacuated residents to return to their homes.

Published: 20 May 2021 09:03 CEST
WWII bomb found in Frankfurt safely detonated after mass evacuation
Experts stand on mountains of sand, which were put in place to soften the force of the explosion of the WWII bomb in Frankfurt's Nordend. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Frank Rumpenhorst

The 500-kilogram unexploded bomb was unearthed during construction work on Wednesday in the densely populated Nordend area of the city, a location firefighters said made it a “particular challenge” to remove.

The Frankfurter Allgemeine newspaper reported the ordnance had been discovered right next to a children’s playground at a depth of about two metres (6.5 feet).

READ ALSO: What you need to know about WWII bomb disposals in Germany

Its report said the controlled blast, which happened just after midnight, “sounded like thunder rumbling” and left a hole three metres deep and ten metres wide.

Firefighters said that they had covered the bomb with 40 truckloads of sand before detonating it, in order to minimise damage to the surrounding buildings.

Around 25,000 people had been asked to evacuate the area, including the occupants of a nearby community hospital’s neonatal ward.

Among residents who took shelter at a skating rink was 29-year-old Tobias, carrying his pet cat in a cage.

He said he had heard the news over a police loudspeaker and been ordered to leave his home immediately, causing a “bit of stress”.

Barbara, 77, told AFP the news was “a bit of a shock, we don’t expect that”.

However, building works in Germany regularly unearth unexploded World War II ordnance, 76 years after the conflict’s end.

Seven bombs were defused in 2020 on land near Berlin where Tesla plans to build its first factory in Europe for electric cars.  

READ ALSO: WWII bomb in Frankfurt triggers 30m high water fountain

Other bombs were also discovered last year in Frankfurt, Cologne, and Dortmund.

In Frankfurt, the discovery of a 1.4-tonne bomb in 2017 led to the removal of 65,000 people, the biggest such evacuation in Europe since 1945.

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