International

An unexploded World War II bomb was found near Borussia Dortmund’s stadium on Thursday, forcing the Bundesliga club to shut down some of their operations.

The British bomb was found at a parking area near the west tribune of the Signal Iduna Park hours before the coach, Jürgen Klopp’s, news conference ahead of the Ruhr valley derby with Schalke 04 on Saturday.

It was discovered after viewing aerial photographs, city officials said. The bomb was defused within hours, with the club posting the all-clear via a message on its official Twitter page.

“The bomb was defused, the clerk’s office, the stadium and the Fan’s World are clear. Everything went well.”

Unexploded World War II ordnance is a relatively common occurrence in Germany where several million tonnes of bombs were dropped during the war by Allied and Soviet forces. The city of Dortmund suffered extensive destruction during bombing raids.