A suspicious container in the Food World parking lot that turned out to be a false alarm snarled traffic on U.S. 31 for nearly an hour Tuesday afternoon as traffic was rerouted to nearby roads.

Pelham Police received a call from a Food World employee about the suspicious container around 3 p.m. after two men in an SUV stopped, dropped off the container and drove off.

“We thought it was suspicious too,” said Pelham Police Lt. Pete Folmar. “We didn’t want to take any chances.”

The Hoover Police bomb squad was called in before it was discovered the container was an empty storage box.