BusinessNews brief

Masts removed from bomb-laden WWII ship in Thames in bid to avoid explosion

WhatsAppXLinkedInEmail
Save for later

American warship sank in 1944 with approximately 1,400 tonnes of munitions onboard A sunken US wartime ship in the Thames estuary holding enough unexploded bombs to devastate a Kent coastal town and send a tidal wave through London has been made slightly safer, ministers have announced.

Engineers have removed the masts of the SS Richard Montgomery – a second world war cargo ship that sank in 1944 with approximately 1,400 tonnes of munitions onboard – without triggering the kind of feared explosion that has kept the wreck under constant guard for decades.

Read the original report at The Guardian.

Read in depth: Business

Sources and context

The Guardian

Source headline and summary supplied via NewsData.io. First collected by NewsJaws on 2026-10-20. This is an automated news brief, not original NewsJaws reporting. Dates reflect the source publication. Feed delays may apply.

Topics in this story

More from Business

See all