More than 200 unexploded second world war shells found near Solomon Islands school

Workers at a school in Solomon Islands discovered a buried stockpile of the second world war munitions as they “dug a hole for sewage”, police said.

More than 200 rust-caked projectiles – which once belonged to US troops – have been dug up and removed after they were found near a school staff member’s house, the Royal Solomon Islands Police Force said.

Japan and the United States fought viciously to control Solomon Islands at the height of the second world war, littering the South Pacific archipelago with unexploded ordnance – or UXOs – that still take lives today.

On Tuesday, Inspector Clifford Tunuki said the long-hidden weapons cache had been ferried away to a safe location and was now “waiting for safe destruction”.

The discovery was an “eye opener”, he said.

“The removal came about when the school discovered the stockpile of US projectiles in front of a staff house when they dug a hole for sewage,” police said in a statement.

The school in Solomon Islands capital Honiara suspended classes for several days, the Solomon Star reported.

Photos showed police removing the heavily corroded munitions by hand after digging them out with a shovel.

The latest find is part of devastating legacy in the Pacific region from the second world war.

Thousands of bombs were dropped on Pacific islands, including Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea and Palau, many of which failed to explode. Munitions depots were also established across the islands.

Two foreign bomb disposal experts were killed in Honiara in 2020 while working to map old weapons caches around the country.

In 2021, more than 100 unexploded second world war bombs were discovered in a back yard of a home in Honiara. The UXO were found by a man who was digging a hole for a new septic system at his property in a residential area.