More bombs turn up at old Athens airport
Athens’s decommissioned seaside airport, earmarked to host several Olympic events in 2004, keeps disgorging explosive reminders of the capital’s turbulent history. Yesterday morning, army de-mining experts discovered two live 250lb (113-kilo) bombs dating from World War II 1.8 meters underground on the grounds of the Hellenikon Airport, which was replaced on March 28, 2001, by the 1.9-billion-euro (658-billion-drachma) Eleftherios Venizelos at Spata. They will be defused and destroyed. A de-mining team looking for unexploded ordnance at Hellenikon, which was bombed by both Axis and Allied forces in WWII, has found at least three more 250lb WWII bombs since mid-September. The grounds will be used for basketball, slalom canoeing and kayaking, baseball, softball, fencing, handball and hockey venues in 2004. Afterward, they are supposed to be turned into parkland.
