Hospital evacuated after WWI artillery shell found in patient’s rectum
A French hospital was evacuated after an eight-inch artillery shell was found in a patient’s rectum.
The incident took place at the Rangueil Accident and Emergency unit at the Rangueil Hospital in Toulouse on January 31st, 2026, when a 24-year-old was rushed in for treatment.
While those who work at the hospital in the south of France have likely seen everything imaginable, little could have prepared them for what occurred on Saturday evening.
A source told the Daily Mail of the bizarre incident, “He was in a state of extreme discomfort, having inserted a large object up his rectum.”
They continued, “Emergency surgery was carried out, and the object was found to be an artillery shell dating back to the First World War.”
As it hadn’t exploded, bomb disposal experts were reportedly called into the hospital to diffuse the shell, and the local fire department also had to be on stand-by, in case of the worst scenario occurring.
When it was being diffused, the hospital had to be evacuated, and a security perimeter was also formed outside of Rangueil. Thankfully, the item was eventually deemed safe and normal service resumed some time later.
Unsurprisingly, the patient was made to stay in the medical facility for a recovery period after the uncomfortable removal surgery.
While it remains unknown how the 24-year-old man, whose identity remains anonymous, ended up with the eight-inch World War I weapon in his rectum, the French newspaper, La Dépêche, noted that hospital staff are “accustomed to treating victims injured during sexual games”.
Bizarrely, a similar incident did once occur in Toulon, which is also in the south of France, in 2022, when an 88-year-old patient also needed to have an eight-inch-long artillery shell removed from his rectum.
