Doctors at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital called for the help of Britain’s explosive ordnance disposal after a man was brought into the emergency room with an anti-tank projectile in his rear.
The huge bullet, about 17 centimetres long and 6 centimetres in diameter, contained no explosive substance and could be removed without danger.
The cartridge was later identified as a 57mm projectile, which was used in anti-tank guns during World War II. According to the British newspaper The Sun, the unfortunate patient, apparently, a collector of items from the war, came across the projectile during a cleanup. The man claims that he put the heavy piece on the ground for a moment, then slipped and landed with his behind exactly on the tip of the cartridge.
The doctors at the Gloucestershire Royal Hospital probably wouldn’t have thought much of it. People are regularly treated for all kinds of things that do not belong behind, and an independent doctor tells The Sun.
“The variety of objects they encounter in hospital emergency rooms in rectums is bizarre: from wine glasses to ketchup bottles to vacuum cleaner parts. That happens almost every day. However, I have never heard of the explosive ordnance disposal being called in.”
Although it was a “harmless” piece of ammunition, the protocol is that the experts were called in, the police said. “We were alerted that someone had been brought in with a piece of ammunition. Bomb experts were also brought in to exclude all risks for patients, staff and visitors.”