World War II Bombs, Torpedo Heads and Naval Mines: How Marine Life Thrives on Dumped Weapons

In the slightly salty sea off the German shoreline lies a wasteland of World War II explosives, torpedoes and mines. Discarded from boats at the end of the second world war and neglected, thousands explosives have accumulated over the years. They form a decaying layer on the low-depth, muddy seafloor of the Lübeck Bay in the western tip of the Baltic Sea.

Over the years, the wartime weapons was ignored and neglected. A increasing amount of visitors traveled to the sandy beaches and calm waters for water sports, kiteboarding and entertainment venues. Beneath the surface, the weapons decayed.

Some of us anticipated to see a desert, with nothing living there because it was all poisoned, explains a scientist.

When the initial researchers went investigating to see what they were doing to the marine environment, the team thought they would find a barren area, with no organisms because it was all poisoned, says a scientist.

What they found surprised them. Vedenin recalls his colleagues reacting with shock when the underwater vehicle first relayed pictures. This was a great moment, he notes.

Thousands of ocean life had made their homes on the explosives, forming a regenerated marine community more populous than the seabed nearby.

This ocean community was evidence to the persistence of life. Truly surprising how much life we observe in locations that are expected to be toxic and dangerous, he explains.

More than 40 starfish had gathered on to one exposed fragment of explosive material. They were residing on steel casings, fuse pockets and transport cases just a short distance from its explosive filling. Marine fish, crustaceans, anemones and mussels were all found on the discarded explosives. You could compare it with a marine reef in terms of the amount of creatures that was present, says Vedenin.

Remarkable Population Density

An mean of more than forty thousand creatures were living on every square metre of the munitions, researchers wrote in their paper on the discovery. The adjacent region was much sparser, with only 8,000 individuals on every meter squared.

It is ironic that things that are meant to kill everything are drawing so much life, says Vedenin. You can see how the natural world evolves after a catastrophic event such as the second world war and how, in some way, marine life finds its way to the most risky locations.

Man-made Features as Marine Environments

Artificial features such as shipwrecks, offshore windfarms, drilling platforms and pipelines can provide replacements, compensating for some of the removed habitat. This research reveals that explosives could be similarly positive – the bloom of marine organisms on those in the Lübeck Bay is likely to be duplicated elsewhere.

Between 1946 and the post-war period, 1.6 million tons of arms were discarded off the German shoreline. Thousands of individuals placed them in boats; a portion were deposited in specific sites, others just discarded at sea en route. This is the initial instance experts have studied how ocean organisms has reacted.

Worldwide Instances of Ocean Transformation

• In the United States, decommissioned oil and gas structures have transformed into coral reefs
• Shipwrecks from the first world war have become habitats for marine life along the Potomac in Maryland
• Tank tracks that have become home to reef-building organisms off Asan in Guam

These locations become even more important for marine life as the oceans are increasingly stripped by fishing, bottom trawling and boat mooring. Shipwrecks and explosive disposal locations effectively serve as sanctuaries – they are not official reserves, but virtually any kind of anthropogenic disturbance is banned, explains Vedenin. As a result a lot of organisms that are usually scarce or diminishing, such as the cod fish, are thriving.

Future Issues

Wherever warfare has taken place in the last century, adjacent waters are usually strewn with explosives, says Vedenin. Millions of tonnes of volatile compounds rest in our oceans.

The sites of these weapons are insufficiently mapped, partly because of national borders, secret defense data and the fact that documents are hidden in historic archives. They pose an detonation and safety danger, as well as danger from the continuous emission of poisonous compounds.

As Germany and other countries begin removing these remains, researchers plan to protect the marine communities that have formed around them. In the Lübeck Bay explosives are already being cleared.

We should substitute these steel remains originating from munitions with some more secure, various non-dangerous structures, like perhaps artificial reefs, says Vedenin.

He currently wishes that what transpires in Lübeck creates a example for replacing material after weapon clearance in different areas – because also the most destructive armaments can become foundation for new life.