Evacuation as fourth bomb found

Diversions have remained in place

About 500 homes, a primary school and an asylum seekers' centre are to be evacuated after a fourth World War II bomb was discovered near a gas line.

Detonation of two remaining bombs is planned for Friday but will depend on cloud cover at the former RAF Oakington airfield north of Cambridge.

Experts say low cloud could cause a dangerous shockwave.

Bomb disposal experts will talk to the Met Office about the conditions before exploding the bombs, said police.

The Cambridgeshire force could not say how many people were going to be affected by Friday's evacuation plans but they would be "significant".

Pathfinder base

Residents of Longstanton who had already been moved in anticipation of controlled explosions on Wednesday were allowed home overnight when plans were put on hold.

Police said diversions and road closures would remain in place.

One bomb had already been been removed on Wednesday and disposal experts spent two days making the second 500lb bomb safe. The controlled explosion left a crater that was 30 metres wide.

As the RAF team were checking the surrounding area for shrapnel on Monday they came across another bomb, just 15 metres from the edge of the blast crater.

Another has been found nearby since then and the search is continuing for others in the area of the wartime airfield where Pathfinder Lancasters and Mosquito bombers were based from November 1943.

Village residents, asylum seekers and staff at Oakington Reception Centre were moved from the Rampton Road area last weekend when surveyors stumbled on the World War II bombs.