France launched a national pilot for a four-day workweek last year, and nothing would be better advertising for the proposal that the rail network being plunged into chaos on a Friday. Track maintenance workers found a 1,100-pound unexploded bomb from World War II while conducting overnight work in Saint-Denis, France, a suburb just north of Paris proper. With de-mining operations ongoing, authorities have evacuated residents, halted rail service and closed a nearby section of the Périphérique, Paris’ ring road.
The tracks closed are on the approach to Gare du Nord, the busiest train station in Europe, the BBC reports. The complete closure of the line is anatomically equivalent to severing an artery. As one of Paris’ seven mainland terminals, the station handles 220 million passengers every year and serves destinations north of the French capital, as its name implies. Beyond commuter and regional trains, international high-speed rail service Eurostar also uses the Gard du Nord to connect Paris to Amsterdam, Brussels, Cologne, and most famously, London through the Channel Tunnel.
Crowds of stranded and confused passengers massed at Gare du Nord and its connected stations in London and Brussels. Those who booked their tickets digitally were utterly lost as the Eurostar app crashed due to the mass cancellations. While other impacted services will resume later today, Eurostar announced its services will resume on Saturday. It left plenty of passengers desperate to adjust plans or find another way to their destination.
History is still alive and potentially lethal
Before you jump to conclusions, it’s not clear when during the conflict the bomb was dropped or which air force dropped the massive explosive. SNCF personnel weren’t surprised that a bomb was roughly six feet under the tracks. France’s rail network was heavily bombed during World War II as the Luftwaffe, and later, the Allies attempted to destroy their enemy’s supply line. However, the bomb’s size caught many by surprise. Philippe Tabarot, France’s transport minister, told Reuters.
“Finding bombs around the railway network is something that happens. But in proportion, like the one today with a bomb of this size, it’s really quite exceptional.”
Even 80 years after World War II, unexploded ordinance is still being rediscovered and is still potentially lethal. A 500-pound bomb exploded at an airport in southwest Japan last October. The civilian airport was formerly a kamikaze base for the Imperial Japanese Navy. However, the explosion was completely unexpected and only captured on CCTV cameras. The blast left behind a 23-foot-wide crater in a taxiway. Thankfully, no one was injured despite a plane being just two minutes prior. History is alive and able to make someone a causality of World War II in 2025.