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M5 TankAn American M5 Light Tank from the 1944 D-Day landings of WWII was unearthed from a street in Chartres (90k/54 miles SW of Paris) yesterday.

Bomb disposal experts were brought in to make sure the thing wasn't fully-loaded and about to go off before it was dug out from its muddy grave apparently in very good condition.

Council workers came across the tank as they carried out routine repairs to the road.

Residents recalled the tank entering the cathedral city where it had been carrying out reconnaissance when it either ran out of fuel or broke down.

Later it was pushed down a hole and buried. Tanks a lot (sorry).

This is not the first time that a tank has been unearthed in France. Ten years ago a First World War British MK4 tank of 27 Tons was found by archaeologists in a vegetable patch in a town near the Belgian border.

M5 Light TankThe M5 Tank was powered by two Cadillac V8s of 110h.p. each that could push it along at 36mph/60kph with a range of 99 miles/160k.

But neither of these discoveries is a patch on the two Soviet Tanks retrieved from a Latvian bog nine years ago that were cleaned down, oil-changed, couple of starter parts replaced, gassed up and driven away.