London, Dec 7 (ANI): A managing director of a printing firm was unknowingly using a live First World War bomb as a paperweight in his office.

Jeff Heyes might not have imagined that the foot long shell given to him by a friend, who discovered it on the seabed of South Coast, will turn out to be a live bomb.

It was his office landlord, Clive Parks, and his friend Jon Williamson, a keen shooter, who realised the detonator on the shell was still live and the TNT was showing.

"I shoot so I know about firearms, it still had a live detonator and the explosive TNT was exposed," the Telegraph quoted Williamson as saying.

"We phoned the managing director and told him and he said, 'I cannot believe it is dangerous, it was given to me by a friend of mine'," he added.

The bomb was carefully moved out of the building and into a flowerbed, before calling the police.

The cops then contacted the army's bomb disposal unit.

Ten police officers arrived at the office in Worcester and two crews from Hereford and Worcester Fire and Rescue Service were on standby in the car park of the nearby Oak Apple pub.

After inspecting the bomb, two soldiers picked the bomb and placed it in a red box before putting it in the back of a truck.

They drove it back to their base in Powick Hams, Worcs, where it is believed a controlled explosion took place.(ANI)