Nazi Bombs, Torpedo Heads and Naval Mines: How Ocean Creatures Flourishes on Discarded Armaments

In the slightly salty sea off the German coast lies a wasteland of Nazi bombs, torpedo heads and mines. Thrown off barges at the end of the World War II and left behind, thousands explosives have accumulated over the years. They create a rusting blanket on the shallow, silty ocean floor of the Bay of Lübeck in the western tip of the Baltic Sea.

Over the decades, the explosive stockpile was ignored and forgotten about. A increasing amount of tourists came to the coastal areas and tranquil sea for jetskiing, kiteboarding and amusement parks. Below the waves, the munitions decayed.

Some of us anticipated to see a desert, with no organisms because it was all poisoned, states Andrey Vedenin.

When the team went searching to see what they were affecting to the ecosystem, researchers anticipated finding a barren area, with nothing living there because it was all contaminated, says the lead researcher.

What they observed surprised them. Vedenin remembers his scientists reacting with shock when the submersible first sent the images back. It was a remarkable experience, he recalls.

Numerous of ocean life had established habitats on the weapons, forming a revitalized marine community richer than the sea floor around it.

This underwater metropolis was proof to the resilience of life. Truly remarkable how much marine organisms we discover in locations that are considered toxic and risky, he states.

Over 40 starfish had gathered on to one visible piece of TNT. They were residing on iron containers, fuse pockets and storage boxes just a short distance from its volatile core. Marine fish, crustaceans, anemones and mussels were all discovered on the discarded explosives. It's similar to a marine reef in terms of the amount of fauna that was present, notes Vedenin.

Unexpected Population Density

An mean of more than 40,000 animals were dwelling on every meter squared of the munitions, researchers wrote in their research on the discovery. The nearby seabed was much less diverse, with only eight thousand creatures on every square metre.

It is ironic that objects that are intended to kill all life are drawing so much marine organisms, states Vedenin. One can observe how the natural world adapts after a catastrophic event such as the second world war and how, in certain respects, life finds its way to the most dangerous places.

Man-made Structures as Marine Habitats

Artificial structures such as sunken vessels, offshore windfarms, drilling platforms and pipelines can create substitutes, compensating for some of the lost marine environment. This investigation demonstrates that munitions could be comparably beneficial – the bloom of life on those in the Bay of Lübeck is probable to be duplicated elsewhere.

Between 1946 and the post-war period, 1.6m tonnes of weapons were disposed of off the German shoreline. Numerous of workers loaded them in vessels; some were dropped in specific locations, the remainder just discarded at sea en route. This is the first time researchers have studied how marine life has adapted.

Worldwide Instances of Ocean Transformation

• In the United States, retired oil and gas structures have turned into coral reefs
• Shipwrecks from the World War I have become habitats for creatures along the Potomac River in Maryland
• Military vehicle parts that have become environment to coral off Asan in Guam

These places become even more valuable for wildlife as the marine environments are increasingly denuded by fishing, seafloor dredging and anchoring. Sunken ships and weapons dump sites essentially act as refuges – they are not national parks, but nearly any kind of anthropogenic disturbance is prohibited, explains Vedenin. As a result a many of species that are typically rare or diminishing, such as the Baltic cod, are flourishing.

Future Factors

Wherever armed conflict has happened in the past 100 years, surrounding seas are typically littered with munitions, states Vedenin. Many millions of tons of dangerous substances lie in our seas.

The sites of these weapons are poorly documented, in part because of international boundaries, restricted defense data and the situation that documents are stored in old files. They create an explosion and security hazard, as well as risk from the ongoing release of toxic chemicals.

As Germany and additional nations start removing these artifacts, scientists aim to preserve the marine communities that have developed in their vicinity. In the Bay of Lübeck weapons are currently being extracted.

We should replace these iron structures originating from munitions with certain less dangerous, various non-dangerous structures, like possibly artificial reefs, says Vedenin.

He now aspires that what happens in Lübeck establishes a model for substituting habitats after explosive extraction in other locations – because even the most destructive weaponry can become scaffolding for new life.