A pressure vessel from a former Elgin gas plant was the cause of road chaos in the centre of the town on Tuesday evening.
The journey home for thousands turned into a nightmare after workers on the flood alleviation project discovered an object that at first sight appeared to be an old explosive device.
Police immediately closed the roads around the area near the Lossie Green car park when the object was discovered on the banks of the River Lossie.
A Royal Navy bomb disposal team was called from Rosyth but by the time they arrived in the early evening it was quickly established that the object was a harmless left-over from a gasworks that had closed in the 1930’s.
When the disposal team arrived they discovered a second object nearby, but a lead member of the disposal team confirmed that there was no cause for concern. PO Diver Richard Brown said: “We believe these are from the old gas works but when the workers excavated the initial end of it then it did look like large ordinance.”
A spokesman for Moray Council said last night that the discovery is unlikely to cause any disruption to continuing flood scheme works, saying that events of this kind are factored into plans as a normal risk when working on such an extensive scheme.
The incident added some unexpected excitement for a group from the local Outdoor Access Forum, who were on a visit to the site to study how there would be new access to the river bank as a result of the works.