Nazi Explosives, Torpedo Heads and Naval Mines: The Way Ocean Creatures Flourishes on Abandoned Armaments

In the slightly salty sea off the Germany's coast lies a graveyard of World War II explosives, torpedoes and mines. Thrown off vessels at the end of the World War II and forgotten about, countless weapons have become matted together over the decades. They comprise a rusting carpet on the low-depth, silty seafloor of the Bay of Lübeck in the western part of the Baltic.

Over the decades, the wartime weapons was overlooked and neglected. A growing number of tourists traveled to the sandy beaches and calm waters for water sports, kite surfing and amusement parks. Underwater, the weapons eroded.

Researchers expected to see a desert, with nothing living there because it was all contaminated, states Andrey Vedenin.

When the team went searching to see what they were affecting to the ecosystem, the team expected to see a barren area, with no organisms because it was all poisoned, says the lead researcher.

What they found amazed them. Vedenin recounts his colleagues shouting with surprise when the underwater vehicle first sent the images back. That moment was a remarkable experience, he notes.

Countless of marine animals had established habitats amid the munitions, developing a regenerated habitat denser than the seabed around it.

This ocean community was proof to the resilience of marine life. Truly astonishing how much marine organisms we find in locations that are expected to be toxic and harmful, he says.

More than 40 sea stars had clustered on to one accessible fragment of TNT. They were living on steel casings, ignition chambers and transport cases just centimetres from its volatile core. Marine fish, crustaceans, sea anemones and mussels were all found on the discarded explosives. You could compare it with a marine reef in terms of the abundance of animal life that was inhabiting the area, notes Vedenin.

Unexpected Creature Concentration

An mean of more than 40,000 creatures were dwelling on every square metre of the weapons, experts reported in their study on the observation. The adjacent region was much less diverse, with only 8,000 organisms on every meter squared.

It is paradoxical that things that are meant to kill all life are hosting so much marine organisms, says Vedenin. It's evident how nature adapts after a catastrophic event such as the second world war and how, in some way, marine life finds its way to the most hazardous locations.

Artificial Features as Ocean Environments

Artificial structures such as sunken vessels, wind turbines, oil rigs and undersea pipes can create alternatives, compensating for some of the removed habitat. This investigation reveals that explosives could be comparably beneficial – the proliferation of life on those in the Bay of Lübeck is expected to be found elsewhere.

Between 1946 and the post-war period, 1.6m tonnes of weapons were discarded off the Germany's shoreline. Thousands of workers placed them in barges; some were deposited in specific sites, others just dumped en route. This is the initial instance experts have studied how ocean organisms has adapted.

Worldwide Examples of Marine Transformation

• In the US, decommissioned energy installations have transformed into coral reefs
• Sunken ships from the World War I have become environments for marine life along the Potomac in the state of Maryland
• Tank tracks that have become environment to coral off Asan beach in Guam

These locations become even more crucial for marine life as the oceans are increasingly stripped by fishing, seafloor dredging and anchoring. Sunken ships and explosive disposal locations essentially act as sanctuaries – they are not official reserves, but nearly any kind of anthropogenic disturbance is banned, says Vedenin. As a result a lot of organisms that are typically scarce or decreasing, such as the cod fish, are flourishing.

Coming Issues

Anywhere warfare has taken place in the recent history, adjacent waters are typically containing weapons, states Vedenin. Millions of tons of volatile compounds rest in our oceans.

The locations of these munitions are insufficiently documented, partially because of sovereign limits, classified military information and the fact that records are buried in historic archives. They create an detonation and security risk, as well as threat from the continuous leakage of toxic chemicals.

As Germany and different states start clearing these relics, scientists plan to protect the ecosystems that have established around them. In the Lübeck Bay explosives are currently being extracted.

Researchers recommend replace these steel remains originating from munitions with some less dangerous, various safe structures, like perhaps artificial reefs, states Vedenin.

He presently hopes that what occurs in the Bay of Lübeck establishes a model for substituting material after munitions removal in other locations – because also the most destructive armaments can become scaffolding for new life.