Nazi Bombs, Torpedoes and Naval Mines: How Ocean Creatures Thrives on Abandoned Armaments

In the brackish waters off the Germany's shoreline lies a graveyard of World War II explosives, torpedoes and naval mines. Dumped from barges at the end of the World War II and left behind, thousands weapons have accumulated over the years. They form a rusting carpet on the low-depth, muddy seafloor of the Lübeck Bay in the western part of the Baltic Sea.

Over the years, the Nazi arsenal was overlooked and forgotten about. A increasing amount of tourists came to the coastal areas and calm waters for water sports, kiteboarding and entertainment venues. Underwater, the munitions deteriorated.

We initially thought to see a barren area, with nothing living there because it was all poisoned, explains a scientist.

When the team went investigating to see what they were affecting to the ecosystem, the team expected to see a desert, with no organisms because it was all contaminated, states the lead researcher.

What they discovered amazed them. Vedenin remembers his scientists shouting with surprise when the submersible first transmitted footage. It was a great moment, he says.

Countless of ocean life had established habitats on the weapons, creating a regenerated ecosystem more populous than the ocean bottom surrounding it.

This ocean community was proof to the persistence of life. Truly surprising how much life we find in places that are considered hazardous and dangerous, he says.

Over 40 starfish had piled on to one visible chunk of TNT. They were living on iron containers, detonator compartments and transport cases just a short distance from its explosive filling. Fish, crustaceans, sea anemones and bivalves were all observed on the old munitions. It's similar to a reef ecosystem in terms of the abundance of creatures that was present, notes Vedenin.

Remarkable Population Density

An mean of more than 40,000 animals were dwelling on every meter squared of the munitions, scientists wrote in their paper on the discovery. The nearby seabed was much sparser, with only eight thousand creatures on every meter squared.

It is paradoxical that things that are designed to destroy everything are drawing so much life, explains Vedenin. You can see 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 hazardous areas.

Artificial Features as Marine Environments

Man-made constructions such as shipwrecks, offshore windfarms, oil rigs and pipelines can offer substitutes, compensating for some of the destroyed habitat. This research demonstrates that explosives could be equally positive – the bloom of life on those in the Bay of Lübeck is probable to be found in other locations.

Between the late 1940s and 1948, 1.6 million tons of munitions were dumped off the German coast. Countless of individuals transported them in vessels; some were placed in specific areas, the remainder just thrown overboard en route. This is the first time experts have documented how ocean organisms has adapted.

Global Examples of Marine Adaptation

• In the United States, retired drilling platforms have turned into reef ecosystems
• Sunken ships from the first world war have become habitats for marine life along the Potomac in the state of Maryland
• Military vehicle parts that have become habitat to reef-building organisms off Asan in Guam

These locations become even more important for wildlife as the oceans are increasingly denuded by fishing, seafloor dredging and boat mooring. Sunken ships and munitions areas practically serve as protected areas – they are not official reserves, but almost any kind of human activity is banned, says Vedenin. Therefore a many of organisms that are typically rare or diminishing, such as the cod fish, are prospering.

Coming Issues

Anywhere armed conflict has happened in the recent history, surrounding seas are often strewn with explosives, explains Vedenin. Many millions of tons of volatile compounds rest in our oceans.

The sites of these explosives are inadequately mapped, in part because of sovereign limits, secret military information and the situation that documents are buried in historical records. They pose an detonation and safety hazard, as well as risk from the ongoing leakage of toxic chemicals.

As Germany and additional nations start clearing these artifacts, scientists aim to safeguard the ecosystems that have developed around them. In the Bay of Lübeck explosives are presently being removed.

We should replace these metal carcasses remaining from weapons with certain less dangerous, some harmless materials, like perhaps man-made habitats, says Vedenin.

He now hopes that what occurs in the Bay of Lübeck sets a precedent for replacing material after munitions removal elsewhere – because also the most destructive armaments can become framework for ocean ecosystems.