Evacuation measures have affected thousands in the German capital as authorities defused a World War II bomb. With Berlin's main station in the evacuation area, there were major disruptions to traffic.
Evacuations of all buildings within 800 meters of the site started from 9 a.m. to allow the bomb disposal to take place. Berlin's main train station fell within the evacuation area, potentially causing disruption for thousands of passengers.
There was something of a holiday atmosphere around the station on Friday morning, as the last few passengers moving out of the station were easily outnumbered by the reporters and TV crews there to interview them, and, unusually, few people seemed to have complained about the organization provided by Germany's rail operator Deutsche Bahn (DB).
Immediately after the bomb was defused, authorities lifted all barriers around the site, and the main railway station was operational again by mid-afternoon.
Central Berlin evacuated for World War II bomb removal
Thousands of Berlin residents and workers were evacuated from the city to allow a World War II bomb to be defused. With Berlin's central train station included in the evacuation area, major traffic delays were expected.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
Thousands evacuated
The 500-kilogram British World War II aerial bomb was discovered during construction work in Berlin's Mitte area on April 18. Police said the bomb was in a safe condition and was not causing any immediate danger, but all buildings within 800 meters of the site had to be evacuated for a number of hours as a precaution while the bomb was being defused on Friday, inconveniencing thousands of people.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/P. Zinken
Extra caution required
While it's common for bombs to be found in Germany, the location of this bomb called for caution. "This is a common occurence in Berlin, obviously there were a lot of unexploded bombs here ... But not generally this close to the city center, we're 300-400 meters from the main train station. The station will be completely closed down, all trains will be diverted," DW reporter Rebecca Ritters said.
Image: Reuters/A. Schmidt
Major traffic disruptions
Berlin's main train station fell just within the evacuation area, causing huge interruptions to traffic in the city center. Germany's rail operator, Deutsche Bahn, said trains would not be stopping at the station from 10 a.m. and rail traffic will be completely shut down from 11:30 a.m. until around 1 p.m. The station is used by some 300,000 travelers every day.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/P. Zinken
A common occurence
More than a million of tonnes of bombs landed in Germany during World War II and it is thought that more than one tenth remain unexploded under the earth. A bomb expert at the site in Berlin told DW reporter Rebecca Ritters that these kinds of bombs were usually stable while sitting still, but when moved they can become unsafe, leading authorities to take no risks during the Berlin bomb disposal.
Image: Reuters/A. Schmidt
Personal police wake-up call
Police posted a video on Twitter showing officers walking up the stairs of an apartment building with the caption: "We're not bringing room service or breakfast in bed but a personal wake-up call ... Residents are being asked to leave their homes due to the bomb from the World War being defused." The disposal of the bomb was expected to start at 11:30 a.m. and the evacuation order lifted by 2 a.m.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
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Holiday atmosphere
Deutsche Bahn employees standing around in the bright spring sunshine offered free water and information — though the evacuation, as DB spokesman Achim Stauss pointed out, had been well reported in local media in advance.
"Today we feel that the travelers are well-prepared — everyone seems to have heard in advance that it is happening," he told DW. "We've never had the scenario before that the railway station was completely shut down for several hours," said Stauss. "So it's a challenging situation, but it's not as bad as other difficult situations, such as when the storms in the fall and winter completely stopped the trains."
The bulk of Friday's complex operation — including the defusing of the bomb itself — was carried out by the Berlin state police. "Since 9 a.m., my colleagues have been walking through the streets of the affected areas of the evacuation zone, knocking on the doors and asking the inhabitants to leave their homes," said Berlin police spokeswoman Konstanze Dassler. "Up to now everything is going smoothly. I'm not aware of any complaints.
"Of course the location of the bomb is pretty inconvenient," she told DW. "We have had a lot of experience defusing bombs and of course with creating evacuation zones, but with the main railway station affected has had a slightly bigger effect."
The discovery of unexploded bombs is not uncommon in Germany, with more than 2,000 tons of bombs and ammunition unearthed across the country every year, though this bomb is "unusually large, unusually thick, and unusually heavy," according to Dassler. "But it is in the hands of specialists, and we trust that this disposal will end positively."
This trust was echoed by other tourists at the scene, such as those staying in a nearby hotel that was just outside the evacuation zone. "Everyone seems very relaxed about it," one German woman said as she wandered past the station. "It seems like Berliners are used to it."
Others, such as velo-taxi driver Golo, saw a small opportunity. "This is usually a really busy place for us," he told DW. "But now that the taxis can't drive up to the station and the roads are blocked, I'm hoping to pick a couple of people up."
Police wrote on Twitter on Wednesday that the bomb was in a safe condition and was not causing any immediate danger.
"We have a lot of respect of course for the work involved in defusing a bomb like this," said Stauss. "We're all crossing our fingers that it will work out, but we're not afraid, and we have full trust in the state police, and we hope we'll be able to re-open the station by 2 p.m."
In fact, as a spokesman for the Berlin fire service pointed out, much of the most difficult work would be taking place away from the cameras, elsewhere in the evacuation radius — part of a nearby hospital, one of the biggest in the city, also had to be evacuated, as were many housebound or bedbound residents nearby.
Berlin's main train station was closed to allow the bomb to be defusedImage: picture-alliance/dpa/P. Zinken
More than a million of tons of bombs landed in Germany during World War II and more than one tenth are thought to be unexploded. Britain's Royal Air Force, in particular, strategically targeted densely populated urban areas in the latter stages of the war.
A bomb expert at the site told DW that these kinds of bombs were quite stable while they were not being moved, but once they began to move it could become unsafe, which was why authorities were not taking any risks.
Unexploded ordnance in Germany - a legacy of the Allied Forces
Over 50,000 people were evacuated from the northern city of Hanover in May 2017, so that bombs from World War II could be defused. Even 72 years after the war ended, unexploded bombs are still found across the country.
Image: picture-alliance/AP/U.S. Strategic Air Forces
What is unexploded ordnance?
Unexploded ordnance (UXO or sometimes also abbreviated to UO), unexploded bombs (UXBs), or explosive remnants of war (ERW) are explosive weapons such as bombs, shells, grenades, land mines, naval mines and cluster munitions that did not explode when they were deployed. Unexploded ordnance still poses the risk of detonation, even decades after they were used or discarded.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/S. Grundmann
Why does Germany have a bomb problem?
Between 1940 and 1945, US and British forces dropped 2.7 million tons of bombs on Europe. Half of those bombs targeted Germany. Experts estimate that close to a quarter of a million bombs did not explode due to technical faults. Thousands of these bombs are still hidden underground, sometimes a few meters down and sometimes just below the surface.
Image: picture-alliance/Everett Collection
How big is the issue?
The industrial Ruhr area and the Lower Rhine region were heavily bombed, as were the cities of Dresden, Hamburg and Hanover. So this is where most of the unexploded ordnance is found. Bombs are usually unearthed during construction work or are discovered during the examination of historical aerial images. Experts say it could still take decades to clear all of the remaining unexploded ordnance.
Image: Reuters/H. Hanschke
What happens when an unexploded bomb is found?
When confronted with the discovery of an UXO, UO or a UXB, bomb disposal experts have to decide whether to defuse it or to carry out a controlled explosion. Many have lost their lives on the job. German authorities are under pressure to remove unexploded ordnance from populated areas. Experts argue that the bombs are becoming more dangerous as time goes by due to material fatigue.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/S. Puchner
How many bomb disposal experts have died?
Eleven bomb technicians have been killed in Germany since 2000, including three who died in a single explosion while trying to defuse a 1,000-pound bomb on the site of a popular flea market in Göttingen in 2010.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/U. Zucchi
Which was the biggest evacuation?
A 1.8-ton bomb dropped by Britain’s Royal Air Force (RAF) was found in the city center of Augsburg on December 20, 2016. The find prompted a large-scale bomb disposal operation and consequently the evacuation of over 54,000 people on December 25. To date, this remains the biggest evacuation for the removal of World War II unexploded ordnance in Germany.
Image: Markus Siefer
What’s the latest?
Authorities conducted another big bomb disposal operation in May 2017, with 50,000 residents in the northwestern city of Hanover forced to evacuate their homes. Thirteen unexploded ordnances from the 1940s were removed. Hanover was a frequent target of Allied bombing in the latter years of the war. On October 9, 1943, some 261,000 bombs were dropped on the city.
