A school boy brought back an interesting object he had dug up from a west Norfolk beach - which turns out to be a World War II explosive.

The pupil had dug up the explosive yesterday while at Thornham beach, near Hunstanton, and curious about the finding, decided to take it back with him to King's Lynn and show his family.

Not understanding the full implications of his discovery, he openly showed the piece to staff at The Rosebery School who immediately implemented their emergency proceedings and evacuated the building.

Police cordoned off the area around Field Lane from around 3pm and bomb disposal experts from RAF Wittering near Peterborough transported the World War II projectile to Hunstanton to carry out a control explosion on the beach.

The Rosebery School in King's Lynn is part of the Short Stay School for Norfolk, a group which primarily provides support and education for young people permanently excluded from school.

Executive Head Des Reynolds said: 'As soon as staff were aware of the item that had been found, well-practiced emergency procedures were immediately put in place.

'The building was evacuated and the emergency services called. Bomb disposal experts removed the item from the site.'

He added: 'I do want to stress that this was no attempt to blow up the school and was not malicious activity whatsoever. Our student had not realised the full implications of what he had found.'

Between 20-25 pupils were in the school at the time, and no damage was caused to the building.

- Did you see any of yesterday's incident? Email louise.hepburn@archant.co.uk