Saltburn Pier was evacuated following the discovery of a 'bomb' on the beach.

A surfers' shop, an amusement arcade and ice cream kiosk on the pier were cleared of people and the resort's famous funicular railway stopped, after a council official found an unexploded First World War artillery shell washed up on the sands.

The 1916 shell was discovered on Tuesday lying just 50 years off the pier, which was only recently re-opened following a £1.3m overhaul.

Cleveland Police immediately cordoned off a 200 yard area of the sea front to await the arrival of a bomb disposal team from the nuclear submarine base at Fasslane, near Glasgow.

The Royal Navy divers blew up the shell in a controlled underwater explosion off the Saltburn coast.

Earlier this year and only 12 hours after the pier re-opened for business after being virtually re-built, an old fishing coble, with a pensioner ill at the helm, crashed into the trestles. Fortunately no damage was caused.

Without the renovation work funded with National Lottery money, the last working Victorian pier on the North-East coast would have collapsed into the sea.

It stood safe until 1924 when a German ship was blown off course and drove through the middle of the pier, causing severe damage.

During the Second World War the pier's length was shortened. A storm, in 1974, swept away the pier head and band stand and it was subsequently shortened again.