WWII bombs found today near German base

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navyfamilyof4

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3rd UXO found today near Opel plant

Another WWII bomb has been found today in the same location as the Oct. 31 and Nov. 20 incidents near the Opel plant in Kaiserslautern.

Department of Emergency Services officials said German explosive ordnance technicians will attempt to defuse the bomb tonight at 10 p.m. Polizei will block Autobahn 6 traffic in both directions in the affected area in the interest of public safety. Vehicles and personnel on Rhine Ordnance Barracks in the affected area will be cleared and military police will close the areas to all personnel at 9:30 p.m.

If we receive further information, we'll post it here.

AFN Kaiserslautern
569th United States Forces Police Squadron
86th Security Forces Squadron
Ramstein Air Base, Germany
 
Cool. It's scary too, but more cool in my opinion. That's a 74 year old bomb, which is either a dud, or can still go bang.
I wonder if they will set up a portable x-ray and get a radiograph of it first?
 
im thinking that is how they found it to begin with right? im clueless about the capabilities though, but maybe using drone xrays?
 
They are found all the time in Germany by mushroom-hunters, hikers, and land surveyors. Usually in places that weren't developed by buildings (or hadn't had a building on them since 1945). 60% of Kaiserslautern was completely destroyed by RAF area bombing raids. Some areas were destroyed over and over again, due to the inexact nature of bombing at the time. When building projects get underway, they find them when they do ground-penetrating radar mapping and soil borings. The government is pretty keen on getting rid of them, since they become progressively more unstable over time.

Dangerous work.
 
I wish we would use ground-penetrating radar. Searching for unexploded bombs starts with looking at photos taken by U.S. and RAF forces before and after bombing raids. These photos have been declassified and are available for research in databases once you start planning a development project. If you see a small crater instead of a big one in the picture you know there is a reason to go looking for a bomb. Depending on the type of ground they can be up to 6 or 7 meters deep.

German government is not enforcing the search for unexploded WWII bombs. Since these are remainders of a war and Germany does not see itself as a legal successor of the Third Reich private owners of property have to pay for the search. In places like Oranienburg they still find like 15 bombs per year. Right around the corner at the former Pioneer Barracks in Hanau we had like 3 bombs in 3 weeks since there is a lot of construction work going on.
 
Props to the extremely brave men of the USAAF who delivered this ordinance to help win the war against the Nazis. My uncle was a B-24 co-pilot who flew 30 combat missions with the 8th Air Force. After the war, he would NEVER get in another airplane for any reason. He was very content to drive a school bus for his "career" after the war. When I was in Germany in the late 80's and early 90's, many German citizens still had great disdain for Americans because of the strategic bombing campaign of WWII, especially in areas that we hit hard like Schweinfurt. For a time there (getting to know the German people), I was a bit sympathetic to their perspective on the war, etc., but really when you think about it, no cost or price was too high to rid the world of the Nazis terrible regime. Definitely the Greatest Generation this country has ever produced.
 
TexasAggie204 said:
Props to the extremely brave men of the USAAF who delivered this ordinance to help win the war against the Nazis. My uncle was a B-24 co-pilot who flew 30 combat missions with the 8th Air Force. After the war, he would NEVER get in another airplane for any reason. He was very content to drive a school bus for his "career" after the war. When I was in Germany in the late 80's and early 90's, many German citizens still had great disdain for Americans because of the strategic bombing campaign of WWII, especially in areas that we hit hard like Schweinfurt. For a time there (getting to know the German people), I was a bit sympathetic to their perspective on the war, etc., but really when you think about it, no cost or price was too high to rid the world of the Nazis terrible regime. Definitely the Greatest Generation this country has ever produced.
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The RAF delivered some ordinance themselves. The German people should also remember that it was Germany that started bombing of civilian areas. My paternal grandmother narrowly survived being killed by a bomb that landed on a hotel in Sheffield. She was due to sing there the same evening but didn't go because of ill health.
 
sanman said:
The RAF delivered some ordinance themselves. The German people should also remember that it was Germany that started bombing of civilian areas. My paternal grandmother narrowly survived being killed by a bomb that landed on a hotel in Sheffield. She was due to sing there the same evening but didn't go because of ill health.
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Yeah, my best man was a Welshman (transplanted to Enfield), and for years I had to listen to him say how England "stood alone" until the US entered the war. We sure had some friendly debates through the years about the war, and each or our country's involvement, etc. All good fun.

One thing that I always fell back on was that at least the RAF flew their missions in the cover of darkness. Our airmen had to be pretty ballsy to fly their missions in the daylight. Thank you Gen. Curtis LeMay!
 
Tough luck those citizens of Schweinfurt had falling under US Army control. They could have been "liberated" by the Soviet Union & enjoyed the workers paradise of East Germany for the next 44 years or so, but those are the breaks.
 
This is what it looks like when a 250 kg WWII bomb goes off in Munich City, just one single bomb. Happened in 2012 when the bomb was found during construction work. It was a controlled explosion after a day of preparations since the EOD people couldn't disarm the detonator:

 
And that was 'only' a 550 lb. bomb. Others that were dropped weighed much more
 
500 kg from WWII at the outskirts of Leipzig. Again controlled explosion. Since 2010 unexploded bombs with detonators with a time fuse will be blown up right at the spot. Moving those things is too dangerous. In 2010 3 people from an EOD time died in an explosion in Goettingen when a time fuse went off.


British 800 kg from WWII close to Nordhausen (V2 rocket assembly site):

 
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