Nazi Bombs, Torpedo Heads and Mines: How Marine Life Prosper on Abandoned Weapons

In the brackish sea off the German coast rests a collection of Nazi bombs, torpedoes and mines. Thrown off barges at the conclusion of the World War II and left behind, numerous explosives have become matted together over the decades. They form a corroding carpet on the low-depth, silty ocean floor of the Bay of Lübeck in the western tip of the Baltic Sea.

Over the years, the wartime weapons was overlooked and forgotten about. A increasing amount of visitors flocked to the sandy beaches and tranquil sea for water sports, kite surfing and amusement parks. Underwater, the weapons eroded.

We initially expected to see a lifeless zone, with no life because it was all toxic, states the lead researcher.

When the team went looking to see what they were doing to the marine environment, the team expected to see a lifeless zone, with nothing living there because it was all poisoned, explains the lead researcher.

What they found amazed them. Vedenin remembers his team members exclaiming in amazement when the ROV first transmitted footage. It was a great moment, he recalls.

Countless of sea creatures had established habitats amid the weapons, forming a renewed habitat more populous than the ocean bottom around it.

This underwater metropolis was proof to the tenacity of marine life. It is actually surprising how much life we find in areas that are supposed to be hazardous and risky, he explains.

Over 40 starfish had clustered on to one accessible fragment of explosive material. They were living on iron containers, ignition chambers and transport cases just centimetres from its dangerous content. Marine fish, crustaceans, anemones and mussels were all observed on the old munitions. It's similar to a coral reef in terms of the abundance of animal life that was inhabiting the area, states Vedenin.

Surprising Creature Concentration

An average of more than forty thousand creatures were residing on every square metre of the munitions, scientists documented in their study on the finding. The nearby seabed was much less diverse, with only 8,000 individuals on every square metre.

It is paradoxical that items that are intended to kill all life are drawing so much marine organisms, says Vedenin. It's evident how the natural world adjusts after a major disaster such as the second world war and how, in certain respects, marine life returns to the most dangerous places.

Man-made Structures as Ocean Habitats

Man-made structures such as shipwrecks, wind turbines, drilling platforms and undersea pipes can provide alternatives, compensating for some of the removed habitat. This study shows that munitions could be similarly positive – the explosion of life on those in the Bay of Lübeck is expected to be repeated elsewhere.

Between the late 1940s and the post-war period, 1.6m tonnes of weapons were disposed of off the German shoreline. Numerous of workers loaded them in barges; some were deposited in allocated locations, the remainder just dumped en route. This is the initial instance experts have recorded how ocean organisms has reacted.

Worldwide Examples of Marine Adaptation

• In the US, retired oil and gas structures have turned into reef ecosystems
• Shipwrecks from the first world war have become homes for marine life along the Potomac in the state of Maryland
• Tank tracks that have become environment to coral off Asan in the Pacific island

These places become even more valuable for marine life as the seas are increasingly depleted by commercial fishing, seafloor dredging and boat mooring. Sunken ships and explosive disposal locations effectively serve as protected areas – they are not official reserves, but nearly any kind of human activity is prohibited, says Vedenin. As a result a many of marine species that are otherwise scarce or declining, such as the cod fish, are flourishing.

Future Considerations

Anywhere armed conflict has occurred in the past 100 years, adjacent waters are often containing weapons, explains Vedenin. Many millions of tonnes of explosive material lie in our marine environments.

The sites of these munitions are inadequately mapped, in part because of sovereign limits, restricted military information and the situation that archives are hidden in historical records. They pose an detonation and security danger, as well as threat from the continuous emission of poisonous compounds.

As the German government and other countries begin extracting these artifacts, scientists plan to preserve the ecosystems that have formed around them. In the Lübeck Bay weapons are already being removed.

We should substitute these iron structures remaining from munitions with certain less dangerous, various non-dangerous materials, like possibly concrete structures, says Vedenin.

He presently aspires that what transpires in Lübeck establishes a precedent for replacing material after weapon clearance in different areas – because including the most harmful weaponry can become framework for marine organisms.