Aston Expressway bomb: Discovery causes chaos for residents evacuated from homes
People were evacuated from their homes with businesses closed as experts dealt with an unexploded Second World War bomb.
Dozens of people were forced to sleep overnight at a leisure complex near Great Barr.
Residents, business owners and workers face uncertainty on when they can return to their homes and premises.
The Second World War bomb was found at a building site in Aston near the A38(M) Aston Expressway yesterday morning.
It led to the closure of the Aston Expressway and slip roads onto the M6 at junction 6 around Spaghetti Junction.
Highways England, Birmingham City Council and police say disruption will continue today.
The city council tweeted: "All road and rail closures expected to remain in place all day Tuesday."
Around 180 brought by mini bus to a makeshift ‘rest centre’ at Alexander Stadium, in Walsall Road, where they were given a hot meal and a bed for the night.
The evacuation started at around 2.30pm on Monday, with householders initially taken to Aston Parish Church but by 4.30pm, when, the problems of carrying out a controlled explosion at the bomb site were realised, they were transferred to the stadium where they slept mainly in the two martial arts halls.
More than 20 council staff and red cross volunteers helped to support the residents aged from tiny babies to people in their late 80s.
Retired taxi driver Noel Daly, of Sutherland Street, said: “There’s been a Blitz atmosphere and the staff have been fantastic but the camp beds were really uncomfortable and no-one slept.”
The 80-year-old, who was out shopping when the alert was raised, returned to find he was barred from approaching his home which was inside the police cordon.
Many of the evacuees were angry that they were not given access to their homes to fetch phones and medication.
Pat Smythe, 75, was unable to take tablets for an anxiety condition .
She said: “It’s been terrible. Other people are diabetic and epileptic and no-one’s got their medication. We’ve phoned the Badger out-of-hours service but they can’t give anything without a prescription and the 101 service passed us a number that was unavailable.”
Coral Bennett, 49, who works as an administrator, said: “The police should have warned us how long this was going to take. It wouldn’t have taken 10 minutes to collect a few essentials to take with us.”
Her sister Dawn Gough, 47, said: “They told me it would only take an hour. They should have been more honest and said they didn’t know,” said the mother of two, who was put up by friends.
“It’s been awful. I tried to go home to get some medication but the police wouldn’t let me through. No-one is telling us anything. We’ve also both got two cats which have not been fed for over 24 hours.”
Around 60 homeless young people, aged 16-25, staying in hostels within the zone, were among the evacuees.
A volunteer from the Birmingham City-based, St Basil’s Homeless Charity said alternative accommodation had been found for them in case the lock-out continued for a second night.
“A lot of them have mental health issues and some have started to get agitated by the situation,” she said. “The conditions are not great. Two old ladies had to sleep in their wheel chairs all night. That’s not good.”
City council spokeswoman Debbie Harrison said two people had been allowed to take their pets, a cat and a dog.
Many of the evacuees left yesterday to go to work or stay with friends leaving 60 being cared for at the stadium’s GMAC Centre.
Rail services have also be hit today affecting trains serving Walsall, Lichfield and Rugeley.
Train operator London Midland confirmed there would be no services on the Cross City north line between Sutton Coldfield and Lichfield City stations.
