DANGER: A Nazi bomb like this is under new stadium

The device is feared to be near the surface of the main stadium where the Queen and other world leaders will gather in 2012. It is listed on the Ministry of Defence’s “abandoned bomb” register, which was compiled from official records kept during the Second World War. The list shows that a bomb of an unknown size was thought to have been dropped by Hitler’s Luftwaffe into a landfill site during the Blitz. That contaminated tip is now the exact site of the Olympic Stadium in Stratford, east London, and on which the eyes of the world will be glued in two years’ time. Britain’s Olympic bosses were aware the bomb might be there, but decided against launching a specific search prior to construction. The potential presence of the bomb was one of the reasons for the resignation in 2006 of Jack Lemley, the former chief executive of the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA), who claimed that the Labour Government and ex-London Mayor Ken Livingstone were pressurising his team to cut costs.

Although the bomb was never found during the excavations for the stadium, the ODA last night insisted the site was “safe”. The bomb is thought to have fallen in 1941 at the height of the German air campaign against British cities during the Second World War. Civil Defence maps and other wartime records show that what is now including the Olympic Park sustained a number of direct hits from bombs ranging between 100 lbs and 2,000 lbs in size. Marshgate Lane, where the main stadium has been built and where several anti-aircraft barrage balloons were located during the war, was bombed at least 13 times.

The documents also reveal that after one raid a large hole had appeared in the Lloyd’s Shoot tip in Marshgate Lane. A wartime bomb disposal team was sent to investigate, but the soldiers failed to find anything because of the large amount of metal debris there. Further searches were conducted in 1942, 1945 and 1949, and although some officers suspected the original hole could have been mistaken for mere subsidence, the incident was added to the post-war Abandoned Bomb list so as to err on the side of caution. In 2007, as work was about to begin building the facilities for 2012, specialists from BAE Systems were commissioned to assess the danger of finding unexploded ordnance on the Olympic site.

Their report, which was presented to the Olympic Delivery Authority, states: “Based on historical records relating to bombing intensity and the various uses of the site, it is a considered to be a statistical certainty that unrecorded UXO remained at the site after the war. “The most likely number of UXBs existing at the site is calculated to be between two and three, including the potential abandoned bomb.” The experts said that based on the relatively soft soil at the site, which is surrounded by rivers and canals, German bombs were likely to have sunk to a maximum depth of about seven metres.

The maximum depth to which the bowl of the Olympic Stadium was dug is also seven metres—but it is far shallower in places. Although BAE Systems said that the chance of the bomb being accidentally detonated was “remote… largely because when the bombs originally malfunctioned they usually failed permanently”, they advised the ODA to employ an “explosives safety engineer” should be present throughout the clearance of the stadium site. However, the ODA was unable to confirm last night whether that had actually happened. Instead, a spokeswoman said: “We carried out extensive research and site investigations, including over 3,000 separate ground investigations up to 30 metres deep across the whole Olympic Park.

“In addition, a large excavation of soil was carried out to form the stadium bowl and then more than 4,000 concrete columns were driven up to 20 metres deep into the ground to form the stadium foundations. “During these works no evidence was found of any unexploded bombs and we are confident that the Olympic site is safe." Last week, the Queen agreed to rename the Olympic site the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park after the 2012 Games are over. Although it will be used for housing, there are serious concerns over the state and future value of the land.