Ms Tokarska said authorities are taking the claim seriously and have convened a meeting of firefighters, police and other authorities to explore how they can safely handle the train if it is located.
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But now a German and a Polish man claim to have found the train and are seeking 10% of the value of the haul.
The 150-metre-long train disappeared in 1945, packed with guns, industrial equipment, gems and other valuable treasure.
As a military train, it is sure to contain weapons, potentially including unexploded bombs and, according to local authorities, there is even the possibility that it could be carrying early Nazi research into nuclear technology.
‘The area has never been excavated before and we don’t know what we might find’.
Local news websites said the apparent find matched reports in local folklore of a train carrying gold and gems that went missing at the end of World War Two near Ksiaz castle.
According to the theory, the tunnel was later closed and its location long forgotten. Tokarska said she did not have any details on the location or the contents of the missing train.
“There have also been serious explorations by groups, which claim to have come close to discovering the tunnels, but so far nothing has been found. No one has ever seen documentary evidence confirming the existence of such trains”. In an interview with Radio Wroclaw on Wednesday, Jaroslaw Chmielewski, the lawyer representing the train’s finders, added to the speculative fever by stating: “this is a discovery of global importance, comparable to that of the Titanic”.
“A handful of people have already looked for the train, damaging the line in the process, but nothing was ever found”, Radio Wroclaw quoted Joanna Lamparska as saying, describing her as a connoisseur of the region’s history.
Workers inspects gold bars taken From Jews by the Nazi.
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The train was intercepted by US soldiers who, according to a subsequent US investigation, helped themselves to some of the loot.
