More WW2 munitions found on Co. Down coast

More WW2 munitions found on Co. Down coast

MORE WW2 munitions have been washing ashore on Lecale beaches.

Amateur metal detectors have made two discoveries near Ardglass and Ballyhornan which brought the Royal Navy bomb disposal team to the area.

On Wednesday a quantity of rifle bullets were found at Sheepland harbour, near Ardglass. There were a number of single bullets as well as a quantity which had been encased in concrete.

The police and South Down Coastguard team closed off the beach until the bomb disposal team arrived and removed the bullets, which had been made in 1944.

It is believed hundreds of thousands of bullets were encased in concrete blocks and dumped in Beaufort's Dyke — a 200 metre deep trench in the Irish Sea — at the end of the Second World War.

On Friday evening the metal detectors then found what was believed to be a WW2 mortar bomb on the beach at Ballyhornan.

The bomb disposal experts examined the bomb and revealed it was a smoke bomb which originally would have little explosive charge. It was removed from the area for destruction.

The police and members of Portaferry Coastguard team closed the beach during the incident.

Two weeks ago a 50kg aerial bomb was discovered at Killard, close to Ballyhornan. The Royal Navy bomb disposal experts have now revealed the bomb did not come from Beaufort's Dyke, as originally thought, but was a German bomb which they believe had been jettisoned during one of the raids on Belfast during the war.

Local people recall the German bombers flew over the Lecale coastline on their way to bomb Belfast.