Europe is having a bad month…
A wildfire is consuming Slovenia and as the blaze moves across areas that were once battlefields during World War I, it’s meeting century-old unexploded ordnance with deadly results.
Full article, HERE from Vice.
Most European countries have ‘specialists’ that deal with UXO, which tend to show up routinely when farmers in Europe plow their land in the spring, or when construction crews find UXO when they go to build a building or something else.
This is just one more issue and a real danger to the firefighters, in addition to heatstroke, the fire, and now UXO blowing up in their faces.
Kudos to them for continuing to get out there and fight the wildfires as successfully as they do! Those folks clank when they walk!!!
Have you ever heard of the Red Zone in France, which is off limits because of chemical contamination from WWI, primarily explosives residue.
It has shrunk from what it used to be as cleanup happened, but it’s still substantial.
Of course being Vice, it’s all due to climate change, oh wait, I mean global warming. Makes it sound like ordnance is going off because the temperatures are pretty hot this year in Europe. I get the UXO is an issue, but tying it to climate? Come on, man! Oh yeah, the UXO in Europe is due to only the bombs dropped by only the US and RAF planes, at least those are on the only ones mentioned in the article.
And they used ‘thread’ instead of ‘threat’….
Jon- Yes, I have. And it is truly sad.
Tom- Yeah, that was a reach… But is anyone surprised? Revisionist history at its best.
Roseville California and the surrounding area has that same problem.
Last big one they found I think was 4 years ago? They’re still turning up bombs.
Circa 1965-66, two times some Combat Engineers “trained” in the Hürtgen Forest under the supervision of an experienced WWII NCO and a German forestmeister veteran. Spooky, dangerous place. I can only imagine a forest fire there.
John- Bombing ranges were all over the place… sigh
WSF- That makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up even now… No, just no!
I appreciate you opinion about the bravery of the people who are willingly going in to fight the fires in Europe. We often don’t understand just how much bravery it takes sometimes to simply do the job that people have signed up to do. And in instances like this, the don’t do it for just money, but for the sense of doing something that is important, no doubt.
America and all other nations should remember that while war is sometimes a necessity to back up what you believe and say, as a nation, it never comes without consequences. And a war like the 2 World Wars, while unavoidable, will carry some of those consequences long after the last shot is fired and the necessary treaties have been signed. Much like the two decades we spent in Afghanistan, the aftereffects will be felt for many, many years.
And then there’s Germany, where they gather together all the unexploded ordnance in a warehouse in a forest that is tinder dry
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-62426412