On Monday afternoon, an unexploded bomb from an American 500-pound aerial bomb was found on the construction site of the future Amazon site near Salzgitter-Watenstedt. This had to be removed on the same day due to the ongoing construction work and the danger to the surrounding area. The explosive ordnance clearance service of the state of Lower Saxony decided to detonate the unexploded bomb after an on-site inspection.
This required an evacuation within a radius of 1000 meters from the site. The area included the town of Salzgitter-Watenstedt and numerous businesses such as MAN and Salzgitter AG, which also had to be evacuated.
Between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m., around 250 citizens of Salzgitter-Watenstedt, truck drivers on site and around 1,500 employees of the local companies were evacuated.
At the same time, emergency accommodation was set up in the sports hall of the Hallendorf elementary school, where over 100 evacuees took up residence. During this time, the citizens' hotline, which was set up immediately, received around 50 calls from citizens with questions about the operation and the evacuation.
A command post was set up on site in Watenstedter Weg. Almost 100 emergency services (professional fire department, volunteer fire departments, DRK and THW), around 50 police officers and the state's explosive ordnance disposal service were deployed. The unexploded ordnance was successfully detonated at around 11.20 pm.
Head of operations Marcus Spiller explains the special nature of the operation: "There are numerous supply lines in the evacuation area. We had to quickly clarify with the utility companies whether these had to be switched off. This went smoothly thanks to close cooperation. The wind turbines on the MAN site also had to be shut down."
Eric Neiseke, Head of the Fire Department and First City Councillor, assessed the operation extremely positively and emphasized: "In Salzgitter, the close cooperation between all aid organizations and the city has proven its worth. The reporting lines on yesterday's day were short and the cooperation between all the emergency services worked well right from the start. I would like to thank everyone involved for this outstanding performance to protect our citizens."