Sacre Boom!
In this life there are times when you can ignore that rattle in your basement, and times when you can’t:
Estate agents are used to talking up the good points of a property while drawing a veil over its less attractive aspects. But it would take a particularly resourceful one to gloss over the downside of La Basse Cour in Belgium.
The first bit is easy: “Attractive farm consisting of seven buildings set in 150 acres in the heart of historic Flanders on the Messines Ridge near Ypres. Ideal getaway for the busy metropolitan family. One hour 30 minutes from Channel Tunnel.”
The problem lies with one of the original features: the bomb. Not any old bomb, but the world’s biggest unexploded bomb – 50,000lbs to be exact. Still there, 80 feet under the farm, waiting for its big day. “Potential for redevelopment” might cover it.
The bomb – or more accurately mine – was the product of one of the greatest and most secret engineering exercises of the First World War. It lay half-forgotten for 80 years until British researchers were able to establish its exact whereabouts using maps of the period.
How do you say “AFLAC” in french?
(via email from Crusader)
World Stuff | Mr. Bingley | 
February 5, 2007 3:33 pm
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Funny. I would have thought it would go off when the other few million pounds went off.
You know, I’ve heard that real estate in that area is booming.
Mining this one for puns is gonna crimp my style, but I’ll get a charge out of the effort.
And, I might add, this post is pure dynamite!
I’ve saved a bottle of Veuve Clixplode for just this occasion!
Sounds like 1917 was a vintage year for Chateau LaPffffft.
You can taste the terroir as it bursts upon your palate, a flinty gravelly roar of earthen notes with just the right touch of sulfur.
Well, the land is still intact, though. Sulfur, so good.
I wonder if his cable channel carries TNT?
No doubt any crops grow explosively on that farm.
I wonder if corn grown there would be self-popping?
Perhaps they could rent the farm out as a honeymoon destination? Their motto: “Want the earth to really move on your wedding night?”
Or perhaps they could lease it as a destination for old men and their young mistresses. Their motto: “Go out with a bang while banging!
Come the rockin’ stroke of midnight, the place is gonna fly sky high…
Not only do the crops grow explosively there Jeff, the parties are a blast.
No doubt the party goers were on a short fuze, Dave.
On a historical note, clearly the post WWI owners were careful about digging their privys, else there would be another meaning to the old phrase, “Fire in the hole!”
No, Marie! I wanteed ah Bud Light!