Unexploded WW2 Bomb Causes Evacuation in Hong Kong

Dropping bombs over Japan during WWII.
Dropping bombs over Japan during WWII.

Yet another Second World War unexploded bomb caused the evacuation of dozens of people in Hong Kong recently.

Construction workers discovered the 227 kg weapon at a construction site on Pok Fu Land Road near a university campus and staff quarters.

The US-made bomb was to be detonated at the site that evening.

Unexploded wartime grenades or bombs are often found by construction workers or hikers in the city, which was the location of ferocious fighting between British allied forces in 1941 and Japanese forces, NDTV reported.

Allied and US air forces frequently bombed Japanese forces following the fall of the then British colony.

In 2016, police disposed of eight explosive materials found by a hiker and in 2014 a wartime bomb weighing nearly one ton, the largest found in the city, was defused, which prompted the evacuation of more than 2,000 people.

The footage below shows us a glimpse of the evacuations which took place from Hong Kong in 1940, before the battle began in earnest.

Ian Harvey

Ian Harvey is one of the authors writing for WAR HISTORY ONLINE