Tallboy bomb explodes in Poland.
 

From BBC new today:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-54522203

"The shock of the latest detonation was reportedly felt in parts of the city" — which sound like a bit of an understatement!

Re: Tallboy bomb explodes in Poland.
 

Amazing that devices from WW1 and WW2 are still dangerous!

Re: Tallboy bomb explodes in Poland.
 

When they find an SC 50 in Britain, the media’s favourite words are “huge” or “massive”. At least this time that would have been a fair description.

I was surprised that only 750 people were evacuated. A few years ago they found a 4,000-pounder in the Rhein and evacuated most of Koblenz.

Re: Tallboy bomb explodes in Poland.
 

From another BB.

Chilmark (long since closed) held the RAF’s strategic reserve of conventional bombs, underground in a network of disused mining tunnels burrowed into a hillside. A friend of mine was station commander there, he told me the story of the “empty” Grand Slam that sat outside Station Headquarters (ie his office) as a Gate Guard.

Seems that some planned work in front of SHQ required the temporary removal of the bomb. So they did their research, found that the empty weight of Grand Slam was 5.5 tons, and brought round the Station’s 6-ton crane to do the job.

Chugga-chugga-chugga-Clunk. Bomb does not move, up come the back wheels of the crane.

Oh dear they said. Let’s just check the bomb’s records, to confirm that it was deactivated? Oh dear (squared), the paperwork can’t be found..

Next steps. Evacuate base, call in EOD squad from RAF Wittering.

The Wittering team arrive, set up a heavily protected control point 100 yds from the Grand Slam, and send forward their remote control “wheelbarrow” bomb disposal robot to gingerly drill a test hole to discover the condition of the bomb’s contents.

Out comes a stream of some 4 tons of rusty brown rainwater.

Re: Tallboy bomb explodes in Poland.
 

In the Netherlands they dismantled a V-1 flying bomb this year. That was big in the news too.

Re: Tallboy bomb explodes in Poland.
 

A very interesting event. If you search for video of the bombing of the Lutzow, you can see this near miss splash and dud actually fall about 50m from the ship in the canal.
These deep penetration bombs were fused on the rear face of the casing.
The danger from the original fuse is probably not much different to other smaller bombs but, I think that the robust casing and large charge probably represent a particular hazard, even today. The reports state that the method being used was to cut the case and burn the charge (Torpex) without detonation. However, as we see, it detonated. It would be interesting to know what the actual cause was?
I wonder if this will be the last Tallboy detonation? There probably are a few other "duds" still out there. The good thing is that they were used on specific targets so, it would seem that an assessment of where duds are could be made. I think that RAF post attack analysis was quite good and maybe the number of Tallboy/Grand Slam duds is in the archive?
Cheers

SM

Re: Tallboy bomb explodes in Poland.
 

100 yds/91 m sounds awful short distance from well over 6 t of TNT (Torpex is 50% more powerful than TNT) even if the explosives would have packed into a pile of sacks but in this case the Torpex was inside a heavy thick-walled casting meaning big heavy fragments if the bomb had exploded.