Unexploded wartime munitions found daily during summer months
Prompt detonation of anti-tank mines startles local residents in Kangasniemi
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During the summer months, the Finnish Defence Forces are contacted on a daily basis with regard to unexploded wartime munitions that have been discovered or unearthed by members of the public.
Such reports are received at a heightened frequency in the summer as people renovate their summer cottages and clear out attic spaces, and wander in forests and on the fields in increasing numbers.
“Many of the finds are Finnish arms caches from the time of the Soviet Red Army's massive Vyborg–Petrozavodsk Offensive in the summer of 1944”, explains information officer Henrik Gahmberg of the Defence Command.
“Then there are those cases, and there quite a few of them, where a live grenade has been brought from the war as a souvenir to decorate the bookcase or mantelpiece.”
Nowadays most of the discoveries are made in Eastern Finland and in Lapland.
In Lapland, thousands of rounds of ammunition and other explosive devices are still uncovered each year, primarily left behind by the retreating Germans in late 1944, as they were pushed north by the Finns in the wake of the Moscow Armistice signed in September.
The size of the finds varies from handgun ammunition and magazines to mines and heavy artillery grenades.
In cities that were exposed to air raids during the Winter War (1939-40) and the Continuation War (1941-44), unexploded bombs weighing up to 500kg have been uncovered from the structures of buildings, for example in Lahti a few years ago (see picture).
In Kangasniemi in the Province of Southern Savo in the southeast of the country, a local resident stumbled upon 18 anti-tank mines in woodland on his farm on Tuesday.
The local police and Defence Forces bomb disposal experts regarded the mines as so dangerous that they were destroyed the same evening and the following night on a field next to the place where they were discovered, around two kilometres away from the centre of the municipality.
The sizeable explosions that ensued startled the nearby residents to the extent that several calls were received by the local emergency response centre regarding the matter.
According to the Southern Savo Police, the locals were not warned because the decision to detonate the mines was made on the spot and relatively late in the evening. According to the Defence Forces, in principle the aim is always to notify people beforehand of large blasts.
In this case it was also not necessary to evacuate anyone from the area, as has often happened with unexploded bombs discovered in built-up surroundings.
Helsingin Sanomat
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| 31.7.2009 - TODAY |
 Unexploded wartime munitions found daily during summer months |
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