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The discovery of what Parisian police termed an “excessively dangerous” unexploded World War II bomb led to significant disruptions on rail and road networks in the French capital on Friday.

Both domestic and international trains were affected, with Eurostar high-speed services to Brussels and London suspended.

Workers digging on a bridge replacement project uncovered the bomb before dawn. The bomb was unearthed by an earth-moving machine from a depth of approximately two meters, near train tracks to the north of Gare du Nord.

Following its discovery, the bomb was reported to emergency police units by the French national railway operator, SNCF, as a potential explosive device. Upon inspection, authorities confirmed it as a WWII-era bomb.

“Preliminary identification of the object revealed it to be a 500-kilogram English bomb, an extremely hazardous item,” said Christophe Pezron, head of the Paris Police Laboratory, which includes bomb disposal services.

According to authorities, if the bomb had exploded during the excavation, it could have caused severe damage. They emphasized the delicate and specialized nature of the deactivation process.

“The risk is always there with objects that contain nearly 300 kilograms of explosives and failed to detonate when they were dropped from a plane,” added Pezron.

The police operation to make the bomb safe led to extensive disruption for hundreds of thousands of travelers and motorists, with the rail network serving Gare du Nord shut down and a segment of the A1 highway closed for around 12 hours.

“I’m pleased and relieved that this ordeal has concluded,” Transport Minister Philippe Tabarot declared on Friday afternoon, as roads reopened and rail services gradually resumed.

“Essentially, the entire northern region of our nation was at a standstill,” observed Tabarot.

The incident resulted in the cancellation of approximately 500 trains, affecting about 600,000 travelers in Gare du Nord alone, and also impacting trains from the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, and Belgium.

Tony, a traveler from the UK, recounted his experience, “It’s been a long day for me, as I woke up before 6 o’clock this morning and took the train from Penzance to Paddington to catch the Eurostar.”

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“Eurostar’s systems have crashed a lot, and they did send an email about the WWII bomb, which led to the cancellation of trains. However, we couldn’t access the website because it was down, so we’re stuck here trying to figure out what to do,” Tony stated.

Gabrielle Cotton, an American tourist traveling from Amsterdam, expressed her predicament, “We had to disembark in Brussels now we’re in line trying to figure out how to get to Paris.”

France frequently encounters unexploded ordnance from World War I and II. While such discoveries are common, they are usually not found in urban areas.

The identified bomb was a 500kg English bomb from WWII, the largest in the Allies’ arsenal.

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The bomb, if it had detonated, had a potential damage radius exceeding 1,000 meters. Fortunately, the deactivation operation was successful, averting a major tragedy.

According to France’s Interior Ministry, since the end of World War II, disposal teams have defused 700,000 air-dropped bombs and nearly 50 million mines, shells, and other explosive devices. The exact number of remaining WWI and WWII bombs is unclear.