World War II Explosives, Torpedo Heads and Naval Mines: How Marine Life Flourishes on Discarded Weapons

In the brackish sea off the German shoreline rests a graveyard of Nazi bombs, torpedo heads and naval mines. Discarded from barges at the end of the second world war and forgotten about, numerous weapons have fused into clusters over the decades. They form a rusting layer on the shallow, muddy seafloor of the Lübeck Bay in the western part of the Baltic.

Over the decades, the explosive stockpile was overlooked and neglected. A increasing amount of visitors came to the coastal areas and calm waters for jetskiing, kiteboarding and amusement parks. Underwater, the munitions eroded.

Researchers thought to see a desert, with no organisms because it was all toxic, states Andrey Vedenin.

When the team went looking to see what they were doing to the marine environment, some of us anticipated finding a desert, with no life because it was all toxic, states a scientist.

What they observed surprised them. Vedenin remembers his team members reacting with shock when the ROV first transmitted footage. That moment was a remarkable experience, he recalls.

Countless of sea creatures had settled on the munitions, developing a revitalized ecosystem more populous than the sea floor around it.

This ocean community was proof to the tenacity of life. Truly astonishing how much life we discover in places that are supposed to be toxic and risky, he states.

Over 40 sea stars had clustered on to one exposed piece of explosive material. They were living on iron containers, fuse pockets and carrying containers just centimetres from its explosive filling. Fish, crabs, anemones and mussels were all found on the discarded explosives. You could compare it with a marine reef in terms of the amount of animal life that was present, notes Vedenin.

Surprising Creature Concentration

An mean of more than 40,000 creatures were living on every square metre of the explosives, experts wrote in their study on the discovery. The adjacent region was much poorer in life, with only eight thousand organisms on every meter squared.

It is paradoxical that things that are designed to eliminate everything are drawing so much life, explains Vedenin. You can see how the natural world evolves after a catastrophic event such as the World War II and how, in certain respects, marine life finds its way to the most hazardous locations.

Artificial Features as Marine Environments

Artificial features such as shipwrecks, offshore windfarms, oil rigs and undersea pipes can provide substitutes, compensating for some of the lost habitat. This research shows that munitions could be similarly advantageous – the bloom of marine organisms on those in the Lübeck Bay is likely to be repeated elsewhere.

Between 1946 and the post-war period, 1.6 million tonnes of munitions were disposed of off the German shoreline. Thousands of workers placed them in vessels; some were placed in designated areas, the remainder just thrown overboard during transport. This is the initial instance researchers have documented how marine life has adapted.

Worldwide Examples of Marine Adaptation

• In the US, retired energy installations have turned into marine habitats
• Sunken ships from the first world war have become habitats for wildlife along the Potomac in the state of Maryland
• Military vehicle parts that have become environment to coral off Asan beach in the Pacific island

These locations become even more important for wildlife as the marine environments are increasingly depleted by commercial fishing, seafloor dredging and anchoring. Sunken ships and weapons dump sites essentially serve as protected areas – they are not national parks, but almost any kind of human activity is prohibited, states Vedenin. Therefore a lot of species that are typically rare or declining, such as the Baltic cod, are prospering.

Future Issues

Wherever warfare has taken place in the recent history, nearby oceans are typically strewn with weapons, states Vedenin. Many millions of tons of dangerous substances rest in our marine environments.

The positions of these weapons are insufficiently recorded, in part because of sovereign limits, secret military information and the reality that archives are stored in historical records. They create an detonation and security danger, as well as risk from the ongoing emission of hazardous substances.

As the German government and additional nations begin clearing these remains, experts hope to protect the marine communities that have formed in their vicinity. In the Bay of Lübeck munitions are currently being cleared.

We should substitute these metal carcasses left from munitions with some less dangerous, various safe materials, like possibly man-made habitats, suggests Vedenin.

He currently aspires that what occurs in Lübeck creates a model for substituting habitats after explosive extraction elsewhere – because also the most damaging weaponry can become foundation for ocean ecosystems.