Authorities said it stopped on Friday at one of France's busiest train stations and on Friday at one of France's busiest train stations.
The bomb was discovered overnight in the outskirts of Saint Dennis near the tracks leading to Gare du Nod, the main Parisian transport hub that serves Northern France and Europe.
Expressways on the commuter and commuter rail were stopped for hours as Paris police dispatched crews cleaning the mines to clean up the bombs. The Eurostar train linking France to the UK, Belgium and the Netherlands was also confused, with travelers at stations serving more than 226 million travelers in 2023.
“At the request of the police, trains to Gare du Nord will be suspended until mid-afternoon,” the French National Railway Company said in a travel notice on Friday.
The type of bomb and the circumstances of its discovery were not immediately clear.
French Minister of Transport Philip Tabarott told SUD Radio that although there is “no worries” about the situation, authorities are taking all the precautions necessary to safely remove the bomb.
“It happens sometimes that we clean up abandoned baggage, but bombs from World War II are pretty rare,” Tabarot said, adding that he expects train traffic to be disrupted throughout the day.
In Europe, it is not uncommon for construction workers to come across misfire weapons from the conflicts that tore the continent in the 20th century, but it is rare for them to find them in populated areas.
Last month, more than 175 training bombs used to train in World War II were discovered under children's playgrounds in northern England. In 2018, thousands of people were evacuated in Berlin after the discovery of a 1,100-pound World War II bomb.
