By Gary J. Kunich, Aviano bureau

VICENZA, Italy — City officials are asking everyone within a roughly 2-mile area of the local cemetery in Vicenza — including soldiers who live at the Caserme Ederle Army post — to evacuate Sunday morning so explosive experts can disarm a 3,300-pound bomb found earlier in the week.

The evacuation affects an unknown number of Americans who live in downtown Vicenza, but not those who live in the Villagio post housing, said Grant Sattler, a Southern European Task Force spokesman. He said the main Caserme Ederle does fall into the outskirts of the radius, but military officials aren’t making the evacuation mandatory for the single soldiers who live in various barracks there.

"City officials consider the chance of explosion very remote, but they’re taking the necessary precautions," Sattler said. "Word is they want everyone to evacuate. We’re certainly not going to knock on doors" to make sure soldiers have left the barracks.

The Army post will be virtually shut down though, with church services canceled and the base exchange and commissary closed. But the Army and Air Force Exchange Service’s food court and Burger King will remain open.

According to local, Italian reports, gravediggers found the British bomb, apparently from World War II, about five weeks ago while moving bodies to another site. Italian cemeteries do this after bodies are buried 25 years and more space is needed.

The city mayor has set up a specific evacuation plan. Those within a 500-meter ring of the cemetery will have electricity and gas and turned off early Sunday morning, all windows should be open and rolling shutters closed in the unlikely event that the bomb explodes.

Army officials have a translated version of the city evacuation plan available at: www.setaf.army.mil.

Access to the city will be blocked beginning at 6 a.m. Sunday and areas have been set up around Vicenza where displaced residents can go until the bomb is disarmed. Sattler said it’s expected to take the entire day.

"This could be a complex operation, and it could take longer than anticipated. If that’s the case, they’ll cease work at 6 p.m. and allow everyone to come home. Then they’ll restart at the same time Monday. That will give enough time to get the word out, but that’s a remote chance," Sattler said.

Dave Osborne in Vicenza, Italy, contributed to this report.