Rangueil Hospital in Toulouse was thrown into chaos with a bomb squad called after a 24-year-old man arrived complaining of severe pain in his bottom
A bomb squad was called to an A&E department after a man showed up at the emergency room with a World War I shell in his rectum.
Rangueil Hospital in Toulouse was thrown into chaos after a patient arrived on Saturday night (January 31) complaining of severe pain in his bottom.
The patient, reported to be a 24-year-old man in French media, explained to medics that he had “introduced an object” into his rectum, but did not specify what exactly it was, La Dépêche reports.
French police sources reportedly said: “At the time of the extraction, the surgeon realized that it is a shell of the First World War, about 16 centimetres long and 4cm wide.”
Horrified nursing staff immediately alerted the authorities and at around 1.40am police arrived on the scene and called in the local bomb squad.
A security perimeter was set up with panicked staff and patients required to clear the area while the explosives experts got to work examining the explosive shell.
“As a precautionary measure, firefighters are mobilized to reinforce in order to prevent any risk of fire during the intervention,” La Dépêche reported.
After examining the object, explosives experts concluded that the artillery shell dated from the end of the First World War and had been decommissioned, so presented no danger.
The origin of the object, French news sources report, remains unknown at this time.
The patient is said to still be under observation at the hospital meanwhile the Toulouse prosecutor’s office has reportedly opened an investigation to shed light on this extraordinary incident.
