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Smoke and dust after the explosion in Munich: four people were injured
Photo: private / dpa
After an aerial bomb explosion in Munich, an operation apparently saved the life of a seriously injured construction worker.
After the four-hour procedure, his condition was now stable, the University Hospital Rechts der Isar told the dpa news agency in Munich.
The man's leg was almost torn off by the force of the detonation.
An interdisciplinary team was able to reconstruct the leg, meanwhile it is also supplied with blood again.
The dud from the Second World War exploded at noon on a Deutsche Bahn construction site along the railway line that leads to Munich Central Station.
In addition to the construction worker who was now operated on, three other people were injured, but not so seriously.
Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann (CSU) was at the scene of the accident to get an idea of the situation.
An aerial bomb weighing 250 kilograms was hit during drilling, said Herrmann, who wished the injured a good recovery.
Why the bomb was not discovered in advance is still unclear.
Normally, on such construction sites, there is always an intensive exploration in advance of where duds could still be hidden, says Herrmann.
He assumes that this also happened on this construction site.
"Now we have to find out: Why was this bomb not recognized beforehand?" He cannot say whether the work can be continued.
That depends on what has been investigated in advance.
That has to be followed up on a case-by-case basis.
All train traffic to and from the main station was suspended for hours, including long-distance traffic.
Trains stopped at the next station or did not leave the main station.
In the afternoon the rail traffic slowly rolled up again.
In the early evening, the railway reported that all closures had been lifted.
All tracks can be used again.
Incidents with duds in the past
Such aerial bombs weighing 250 kilograms are most frequently found, according to information from the Güteschutzgemeinschaft Kampfmittelräumung.
According to the association, how high its explosive power is also depends on the depth at which it is buried in the ground.
The higher it is, the more dangerous it is.
There are repeated incidents with duds that have been buried in the ground since the Second World War.
In September 1994 three construction workers died in Berlin when a bomb exploded in a construction pit.
In 2006 a man was killed in Aschaffenburg because a dud exploded.
Disarming can also lead to accidents, such as in June 2010 when three demolition experts died and two people were seriously injured during a routine operation.
A 250-kilogram bomb was discovered in Munich in 2012.
Because it was not possible to defuse it, it had to be blown up in a controlled manner.
2500 residents in the Schwabing district had to leave their homes.
The shock wave damaged facades and windows.
ptz / dpa
