POLICE cordoned off Cliff Road in Dovercourt and planned to evacuate 20 people from a block of flats in the street after a grenade was found.

Tendring Council set up a reception area for the residents at the Park Pavilion in Barrack Lane but staff were later stood down.

Nigel Brown, the council’s communications manager, said: “We were getting Park Pavilion ready to take those people we had been asked to accommodate by the police.

“We were informed to expect a maximum of 20 and they would have been made comfortable and looked after by volunteer staff for as long as it had been necessary.

“Tendring Council staff had already been called away from their normal duties and were at the Pavilion when we got the call to stand down.

“The main thing is that we put our emergency plan into effect and were ready to deal with the evacuees should it have been required.”

Essex Police had set up a 100 metre exclusion zone around the area where the grenade was said to have been found and the army's bomb disposal unit was called.

Police are yet to confirm the details of the incident.

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