The Remnants Of War

Germany:

The flatlands of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, a sparsely populated state that covers northeastern Germany, are still littered with thousands of tons of unexploded ordnance from the Nazi era. There are cluster bombs, mortar shells, hand grenades, rockets. Most were manufactured and abandoned by the Third Reich, but there are also plenty of aging but still potent explosives left here and in neighboring states by Soviet, U.S. and British forces.

For more than 60 years, German bomb squads have been cleaning up. They comb through the woods and dredge the ponds, sift through construction sites and back yards. There's no end in sight.

"In my lifetime, I will never see all the munitions cleaned up in this area of Germany," said Sebastian Dosdall, the boss of this bomb-disposal crew, clad in a pea-green jacket, work pants and metal-shanked boots. "It's hard to clear everything, everywhere."

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Comments

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once or twice a month still, here in France, there is a construction project halted and the area evacuated because bombs are found below the ground from WW2 and still from WW1! Someone found one in their garden last summer in Bordeaux and an a section of the city was evacuated.