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View all search resultsFive dead, three missing in Papua after WWII bomb explodes
The island, located just off the northwest coast of mainland Papua, was a key WWII battleground between United States and Japanese forces, though police have yet to uncover how the bomb ended up in the coastal fisheries settlement in Yanures village, Kota Biak district.
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A stock illustration of an explosion. (Shutterstock/Dora Ubaldina)
F
ive people were killed and three others are still missing after explosive ordnance dating to World War II detonated on Sunday in a coastal settlement on Biak Island in Biak Numfor regency, Papua.
The blast occurred in the Fisheries Complex in Yanures village of Biak Kota district, prompting a large-scale emergency response involving local police and relevant authorities, including officials from state agencies.
"We have not started searching for the missing people [yet] because we are waiting for the bomb disposal unit to be deployed from the Papua Police headquarters in Jayapura to secure the area [of the blast]," Biak Numfor Police chief Sr. Adj. Comr. Arie Trestiawan said on Monday, as quoted by Kompas.com.
Arie said investigators believed that the area might still contain additional unexploded ordnance, so authorities had postponed a full-scale search and rescue operation until bomb technicians declared the site safe “from the threat of further explosions".
Authorities had established a security perimeter around the blast site and evacuated more than 50 people from nearby neighborhoods while waiting for the bomb squad to arrive and clear the area, he added.
"The site of the explosion has been temporarily secured pending a thorough safety assessment by the bomb disposal unit," Arie said.
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