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submitted 2 months ago by Hubi@feddit.org to c/world@lemmy.world
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[-] ytsedude@lemmy.world 139 points 2 months ago

A total of 2,348 bombs weighing 41 tons were disposed of during fiscal year 2023, the Reuters news agency reported, citing the Self-Defense Force.

Holy shit. Other than the obvious, I never learned much in school about the Allied bombing campaign in Japan during WWII... which, now that I think about it, was probably on purpose.

[-] pandapoo@sh.itjust.works 82 points 2 months ago

This is going to be one of the horrors of Ukraine. A legacy of landmines that will not be cleared in most of our lifetimes, even if the war ended today.

Not the same as unexploded airdropped ordinance, but significantly worse.

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[-] HK65@sopuli.xyz 67 points 2 months ago

Not just in Japan, in Europe as well.

We're still finding random shit from all sides, IIRC there is a fully loaded German heavy bomber on the bottom of the lake near where I grew up

[-] aramis87@fedia.io 42 points 2 months ago

A few years ago, near where my family lived in New Jersey, there was a small newspaper article mentioning that construction on a set of mid-rise condominiums on the Delaware River was being notably delayed, with the vague implication that there was some trouble with financing or construction or something. [To be fair, both of these were true, but for very not-obvious reasons.] But then you start tracing back through the history of the site:

They had selected the site for the condos because it had been the site of a large flea market from the late 1970s to early 2000s, so all they'd have to do was dig up the parking lots, lay in utilities, and compact the soil to be ready to build. The flea market was there because it was the site of a massive drive-in movie theatre built in the early 1950s, so all they had had to do was put up some cheap buildings that were eventually condemned and torn down. The drive-in movie theatre was there because the land had already been cleared and flattened by the US government, so it was cheap to put in a parking lot and big screen.

Why had the government so kindly cleared and flattened the ground? Well, the site was right next to a small bridge across the Delaware; on the other side of the bridge was Frankford Arsenal, where they produced munitions during both World Wars. And they had to test the munitions, so they'd drive over the bridge and test them at this site in New Jersey. And it turns out that sometimes they were either high or lazy or careless or something, because sometimes they didn't bother driving across the bridge, they'd just shell New Jersey from across the river instead.

The shelling led to a bunch of unexploded ordinance being in extremely unexpected places, until it started showing up eighty years later, when the condo people actually started digging up the ground to lay in their utilities. Of course, the condo association was quietly and casually referencing vague construction delays, because if people knew it was a munitions testing site and they'd recently found a bunch of UXO, no one would buy the condos.

[Also, while trying to look up details for this comment, I discovered three other cases of UXO in New Jersey in the past couple years. This is all very weird to me.]

[-] BakerBagel@midwest.social 43 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Strange, because the idea of shelling New Jersey seems very natural to the rest of us

[-] mx_smith@lemmy.world 5 points 2 months ago

And it turns out that sometimes they were either high or lazy or careless or something

No they were just normal people from Philly

[-] catloaf@lemm.ee 4 points 2 months ago

They probably shelled it because they were testing the shells as fired from artillery or whatever.

[-] Dozzi92@lemmy.world 4 points 2 months ago

Damn, I'm from Jersey, though Central, and this is all news to me. And I'm aware of the Frankfurt Armory explosion and all of that, but never did any research beyond. Very interesting.

[-] aramis87@fedia.io 3 points 2 months ago

It's the old Tacony-Palmyra Drive-In site. More fun facts: part of the area they're building on used to be a landfill for Philadelphia, which is still contaminated - they've just paved it over. Oh, and the condos they're building? They're being used to fulfill the town's low-income housing requirements (as required by Mount Laurel I and II). I'm sure the developers are being quite open with the residents that their lovely new buildings are on top of a munitions testing site and a landfill ... :(

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[-] JayObey711@lemmy.world 25 points 2 months ago

I used to live in an area that was one of the biggest targets for bombers in Germany during WW2. I remember every few months there was a bomb alarm. We had to leave the house for a few hours while it was being defused. No bomb ever blew up luckily and it just became routine.

[-] CheeseNoodle@lemmy.world 11 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

There's potentially up to a few kilotons worth of munitions (about half a hiroshima bomb) sitting right next to Kent (England) in a sunken liberty ship.

[-] AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 4 points 2 months ago

Is that the one in the Thames, or another one? I wouldn't be surprised if there are several around GB

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[-] CptEnder@lemmy.world 34 points 2 months ago

Wait til you hear about Cambodia...

[-] ShepherdPie@midwest.social 13 points 2 months ago

And western Europe and the Middle East

[-] pandapoo@sh.itjust.works 12 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

They're referring to landmines, leftover from that region's wars of the mid-20th century: America's Vietnam & Cambodian war, French-Indochina war, Cambodian civil war, etc.

The legacy of landmines and chemical warfare is still regularly killing, maiming, and causes significant increases in fetal birth defects and other rare illnesses.

[-] jimbolauski@lemm.ee 17 points 2 months ago

The Doolittle raids are fairly well know but the fire bombings carried out after that were not. The E-46 cluster bomb was pretty terrible 3 - 5 seconds after hitting the ground a small explosion would ignite and spread flaming napalm. The updraft from the fires was so bad some bombers lost control and crashed.

[-] pandapoo@sh.itjust.works 4 points 2 months ago

Japanese cities were primarily built using wood as it was better suited for their climate and earthquakes. The fire bombing of Tokyo with a single deadliest attack on the Japanese mainland, killing even more than either atomic bomb drop.

If you're interested in the worst of it you should look up firebombing and why it was so effective against Japan.

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[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 118 points 2 months ago

Meanwhile, in a nursing home in Iowa, a man sits bolt upright in bed and says, "I told you I hit the target!"

[-] aeronmelon@lemmy.world 64 points 2 months ago

Cotton Hill from King of the Hill, someone who continues to be racist towards the Japanese despite the war being over.

“Haha! Got ‘em again!”

[-] AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 10 points 2 months ago

<Looks at the news the next day]

Dang it! They weren't Japanese! They're Laotian!

[-] JIMMERZ@lemm.ee 6 points 2 months ago
[-] Agent641@lemmy.world 78 points 2 months ago

Me, realizing she was flirting with me at that party 15 years ago.

[-] datavoid@lemmy.ml 4 points 2 months ago

You shit yourself and cleared the house?

[-] Deceptichum@quokk.au 67 points 2 months ago

So like if these kill ya, are you a WW2 fatality?

[-] Hubi@feddit.org 63 points 2 months ago

Not sure how it's handled in Japan but I know this is how it works in Germany and France, for both WW1 and WW2.

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[-] idunnololz@lemmy.world 59 points 2 months ago

No injuries were reported

Phew. That's a relief.

[-] AwesomeLowlander@sh.itjust.works 24 points 2 months ago

So you're saying, the US just bombed Japan?

[-] aeronmelon@lemmy.world 40 points 2 months ago

“Cap, why are you putting an 80-year fuse on that bomb?”

“Because they’ll never suspect it!”

[-] DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 3 points 2 months ago

His brother was in Bhutan, and he didn't quite understand the difference between a cold dish and a frozen one.

[-] etchinghillside@reddthat.com 14 points 2 months ago

Huh? A timetraveling bomb was dropped?

[-] weew@lemmy.ca 79 points 2 months ago

Yes, the bomb travelled forward in time at one minute per minute

[-] runeko@programming.dev 24 points 2 months ago

Truely, we are living in the future.

[-] Astronauticaldb@lemmy.world 26 points 2 months ago

It was a dud; normally when bombs get dropped and don't explode, they're considered to be a potential hazard at any time, but most people think that these duds are so old they can't possibly be able to explode anymore.

[-] moody@lemmings.world 10 points 2 months ago

Other unexploded ordinance dropped by the United States

Dropping bylaws on the masses

[-] Eideen@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago

I impressed that it have not exploded earlier.

[-] skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de 26 points 2 months ago

any explosive weapon will sometimes leave duds, there are GMLRS, javelin and excalibur duds documented. ww1 era shells could be the worst because by some estimates up to some 20% failed, then fuzes were often brass so they didn't corrode, but shell or bomb body were steel or cast iron so they did. when fuze gets almost set off then loses mechanical support it sometimes becomes more likely it'll be initiated on its own

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[-] technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Wait until they hear about Vietnam, Cambodia, etc...

If the planet survives this genocidal empire, it will take centuries to undo the damage.

[-] Krono@lemmy.today 10 points 2 months ago

After America's unprovoked and genocidal bombing campaign in Cambodia ended, the remaining ordinance has killed 20k and injured 60k more.

For my fellow Americans, that is five 9/11s.

The bombs still claim a handful of lives and a few dozen limbs in 2024.

[-] DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Japan earned every bomb dropped on it with change to spare, unlike Vietnam and Cambodia. They're not equivalent, and this bomb didn't cause any casualties.

[-] imPastaSyndrome@lemm.ee 6 points 2 months ago

But why did they leave it there?

[-] jimbolauski@lemm.ee 36 points 2 months ago

Someone was paid to push dirt over a small hole to build a runway not dig for bombs.

[-] yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de 4 points 2 months ago

Not necessarily, bombs that don't explode usually land on very soft ground - presumably the hole closed itself on top of the bomb right as it buried itself in.

[-] JoMiran@lemmy.ml 35 points 2 months ago

It likely buried itself deep into the ground after it dropped from the bomber and failed to detonate.

[-] x4740N@lemm.ee 23 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

It's likely they didn't know it was there

[-] skillissuer@discuss.tchncs.de 10 points 2 months ago

bombs are single use, there's no need to pick it up now

why it was there in the first place? they probably had no idea, or if there was post-war cleanup it went undetected for some reason

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[-] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 7 points 2 months ago

Hey Mr. Kimura, where should we build our new airport?

Mr. Koizumi, we have a big plot of empty land over here, do you remember why we haven't built anything there yet?

... No?

... Okay!

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this post was submitted on 02 Oct 2024
375 points (99.2% liked)

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