SHOCKED firefighters discovered a World War II bomb in a chest after tackling a serious house fire.

Bomb squad officers were immediately called to defuse the unexploded German mortar bomb.

Firemen had been called to the house in Taylor Street, Golborne, at 8.30pm last night after the blaze broke out in the kitchen and had spread to the stairs, landing and loft.

Leigh firefighters managed to control the inferno and extinguish the blaze but it was while they were damping down the burnt material and making a search of the house that they discovered the bomb tucked away in a chest in an upstairs bedroom.

A firebrigade spokesman said: "The officer who found the bomb was very shocked. There was a police officer on the scene already and he immediately called in the bomb squad."

The bomb disposal experts arrived to defuse the device but residents in the row of terraced houses were not evacuated. Police are investigating the cause of the fire which is believed to have been started by a burglar.

A police spokesman said: "The bomb squad was called at 11.53pm. A fire officer discovered an unexploded mortar shell. It was a World War II incendiary device which was made safe. No other devices were found."

Police are investigating the cause of the fire which is believed to have been started by a burglar.

No-one was in the house at the time.