The Down Range Forum
Member Section => Down Range Cafe => Topic started by: twyacht on December 03, 2011, 01:29:22 PM
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http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_GERMANY_BOMB_EVACUATION?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-12-03-07-57-38
BERLIN (AP) -- Officials in Germany's western city of Koblenz say some 45,000 residents have to be evacuated as officials try to defuse a World War II era bomb discovered in the Rhine river.
City officials said Saturday the massive British 1.8 ton bomb will be defused early Sunday, requiring all residents within a radius of about 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) from the bomb site to leave their homes for the day.
Officials say seven nursing homes, two hospitals and a prison are also being evacuated. Train and road traffic in the area, some 130 kilometers northwest of Frankfurt, will come to a halt.
The British bomb was found last week alongside a 275 pound bomb dropped there by U.S. forces during WWII, after Rhine's water level fell due to lack of rain.
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1.8 Tons!!! Holy Smokes!!!! The Bomb Disposal Unit better bring their "A" game..No Bomb Suit Required
:o
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The fun is just starting. I doubt they will try to open something that has been sitting under water for 65 years...especial when a gentle touch is required. If so, they would likely try to move it someplace for detonation or attempted detonation. And if that is so, there will be evacuations along the route.
Think a helicopter could lift it and move effectively?
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I question the accuracy of this.
1.8 tons is a big freaking bomb, it is unlikely it could have fit in an unmodified bomb bay.
I suspect there was a mistake in converting between metric and english since we also never used 275 pounders, they were 250 pounds.
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I thought the Lancasters could carry 1000lb bombs. But the literal carpet bombing runs, who know what they strapped to them.
BBC also has it as 1.8tonnes with a pic.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16018659
Here's a vid, it seems they did have some that big.
http://www.skynews.com.au/world/article.aspx?id=692480&vId=2893406&cId=World
Spiegal has it at 3meters approx 10feet long.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,800947,00.html
One article stated, more are likely to be discovered if river levels keep falling.....
Be an interesting fishing trip if you snagged one and yanked real hard... :o
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I question the accuracy of this.
1.8 tons is a big freaking bomb, it is unlikely it could have fit in an unmodified bomb bay.
I suspect there was a mistake in converting between metric and english since we also never used 275 pounders, they were 250 pounds.
My initial thinking after reading this was that it could be reporting yield in tons (equal to 1.8 tons of TNT), but then I reread and the US bomb is in pounds. I doubt they would report one in yield and another in weight. :-\
Quick look around though shows several sources of 2000 lbs bombs; so, it's possible. Conversion confusion wouldn't surprise me either. I think either way we can all agree that it's a freaking huge bomb.
Be an interesting fishing trip if you snagged one and yanked real hard... :o
During my search, I found several articles discussing unexploded bombs from WWII still being found in Europe, esp Germany.
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Fat Man dropped on Nagasaki weighed over 5 tons.
1800 pounds is nothing for a B-29 though they weren't used much in Europe.
Correction, 1.8 tonnes is about 4000 lbs. oops...still no problem for a heavy bomber. Coincidentally, the RAF used the B-29 towards the end of the war.
2 metric ton is 4480 lbs.
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Fat Man dropped on Nagasaki weighed over 5 tons.
1800 pounds is nothing for a B-29 though they weren't used much in Europe.
Correction, 1.8 tonnes is about 4000 lbs. oops...still no problem for a heavy bomber. Coincidentally, the RAF used the B-29 towards the end of the war.
2 metric ton is 4480 lbs.
Got a source for that? I was not aware that any B-29s made it to Europe, and I would guess the USAAF would get them before the RAF.
As for the bomb, I'm guessing it was one of the anti-sub pen/bunker bombs, they were huge. The biggest problem was not the weight but the size - the Lancasters could only carry 1 and it went nose first straight down after being dropped.
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Got a source for that? I was not aware that any B-29s made it to Europe, and I would guess the USAAF would get them before the RAF.
As for the bomb, I'm guessing it was one of the anti-sub pen/bunker bombs, they were huge. The biggest problem was not the weight but the size - the Lancasters could only carry 1 and it went nose first straight down after being dropped.
It was from Wiki and I misread the article. It was post war use in the late forties and early fifties...sorry!
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We had bombs up about 22 tons so a 2 ton bomb doesn't surprise me.
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The Dam Busters dropped 10 ton bombs but the planes had to be specially modified, they would not even fit inside the plane. I would bet it was a 2000 pound bomb and some one screwed up converting from metric tons to standard tons.
We dropped a lot of 2000 pounders and 2000 KILOS is 2 metric tonnes
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The RAF's Avro Lancaster could carry 14,000 lbs of bombs. By the end of the war specially modified versions were lifting 22,000 lbs. One common load was a 4000ld HC and 20 incendiaries or20 250lb bombs. See photo on link
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockbuster_bomb
This looks like a 4000lb HC Blockbuster.
This is a link to a similar bomb being defused in 1977. According to Der Spiegel they find a bomb every week just not this big. http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,584091,00.html
"In the whole of Germany, more than 2,000 tons of American and British aerial bombs and all sorts of munitions ranging from German hand grenades and tank mines to Russian artillery shells are recovered each year. Barely a week goes by without a city street or motorway being cordoned off or even evacuated in Germany due to an unexploded bomb being discovered.
"Unearthed munitions that can be transported safely are taken to a detonation ground where they are exploded or have their explosives removed. But many bombs -- and all bombs with delay-action detonators -- are too dangerous to be moved and must be either defused or detonated where they are found.
Weise said it will take at least another 20 years before Brandenburg's bombs are cleared, and that the state is particularly contaminated with American delay-action bombs which have become so unstable that it will soon be impossible to defuse them safely. The bombs are on a hair trigger because their chemical detonators have been worn down by acetone vapors as they have lain lurking in the ground for over 60 years."
According to Wikipedia; "The bombs then called Blockbusters were the RAF's 4,000 lb — also known as a cookie — 8,000 and 12,000 lb (1,800, 3,600 and 5,400 kg) HC (High Capacity) bombs. These bombs had especially thin casings that allowed them to contain approximately three-quarters of their weight in explosive, with the 4,000 pounder containing over 3,000 lb (1,360 kg) of Amatol. " 1.8 tonnes (metric tons) would be the equivalent of 4000lb (Imperial pounds)
Tallboys and Grand Slams (earthquake bombs) were even bigger.
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2000 tons a YEAR ?
Since '45, = 132,000 tons.
Seems we could have saved resources by just dropping rocks on them.
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I figured as unstable as it would be they would just blow it in place
http://news.yahoo.com/massive-wwii-bomb-succesfully-defused-germany-153757894.html
BERLIN (AP) — A massive British World War II-era bomb that triggered the evacuation of about half of the 107,000 residents of Germany's western city of Koblenz was successfully defused Sunday, authorities said.
MORE AT LINK >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
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I see Iron Balls Harold Von Wilhelm did the job ;)....With those kind of numbers on unexploded ordinance, that's one heck of a career.
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He's either going to retire to the South of France,
or land there ;D
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Think a helicopter could lift it and move effectively?
nope, helicopters ride about as smooth as oatmeal.
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Amazing Job!!!...
Some guts and nerves to get that job done....
The guy who did it is probably afraid to fly or ride on the Autobahn with all the idiot drivers out there ;D