In German cities, it means alerts, traffic, evacuations, and at least a little anxiety.
What Happens When They Find a World War II Bomb Down the Street
by Andrew Curry - Atlas Obscura
What Happens When They Find a World War II Bomb Down the Street
by Andrew Curry - Atlas Obscura
Quote:
I FOUND OUT ABOUT THE bomb down the street by text message . . .
What, my wife wanted to know, what were we going to do?
This question is not as unusual as one might think, at least in German cities and others hit hard during the war. Between 1940 and 1945, Allied forces dropped 2.7 million tons of bombs on Nazi-occupied Europe. That's about 1.25 million explosive objects in totalranging from small incendiary charges meant to set fire to wooden buildings to multi-ton "blockbusters." An estimated one in five bombs dropped failed to explode, which translates to about 250,000 duds. Often, the explosive-packed shells penetrated several feet into the ground, and were later covered up by rubble and debris from other, more successful explosions.
This means many German cities are, more or less, built on top of live explosives. Western cities such as Cologne, Duesseldorf, and Bremen, which are closer to air bases in Britain and full of industrial targets, were particularly hard-hit, and bombs regularly turn up there. Berlin, then and now the German capital, was a major target, too. Since the war's end, more than 2,000 live bombs have been recovered here. Some experts estimate 15,000 more may remain hidden under the fast-growing city. In the surrounding state of Brandenburg, the scene of bitter fighting in the last months of the war, police deal with 500 tons of munitions each year.
