Nazi Bombs, Torpedoes and Mines: The Way Ocean Creatures Prosper on Discarded Weapons

In the brackish waters off the German coast rests a graveyard of World War II explosives, torpedoes and mines. Discarded from boats at the end of the World War II and neglected, countless weapons have accumulated over the years. They form a decaying carpet on the low-depth, muddy seafloor of the Lübeck Bay in the western tip of the Baltic.

Over the years, the wartime weapons was ignored and forgotten about. A growing number of visitors flocked to the coastal areas and calm waters for jetskiing, kite surfing and entertainment venues. Underwater, the weapons eroded.

We initially expected to see a desert, with nothing living there because it was all toxic, explains a scientist.

When the team went looking to see what they were affecting to the marine environment, researchers expected to see a lifeless zone, with no organisms because it was all poisoned, states the lead researcher.

What they observed astonished them. Vedenin recalls his colleagues shouting with surprise when the submersible first sent the images back. It was a great moment, he says.

Numerous of sea creatures had settled among the munitions, developing a revitalized ecosystem more populous than the ocean bottom surrounding it.

This marine city was evidence to the tenacity of marine life. Indeed surprising how much life we find in locations that are expected to be toxic and risky, he says.

More than 40 starfish had gathered on to one exposed piece of explosive material. They were dwelling on steel casings, fuse pockets and carrying containers just centimetres from its volatile core. Marine fish, crabs, anemones and mussels were all discovered on the discarded explosives. You could compare it with a coral reef in terms of the abundance of fauna that was present, notes Vedenin.

Remarkable Population Density

An mean of more than forty thousand animals were living on every square metre of the weapons, scientists documented in their study on the discovery. The nearby seabed was much sparser, with only 8,000 creatures on every meter squared.

It is ironic that objects that are designed to destroy all life are attracting so much life, states Vedenin. It's evident how nature evolves after a major disaster such as the second world war and how, in certain respects, life finds its way to the most dangerous locations.

Artificial Structures as Ocean Environments

Man-made features such as sunken vessels, wind turbines, oil rigs and pipelines can offer alternatives, restoring some of the lost habitat. This investigation demonstrates that explosives could be equally positive – the proliferation of life on those in the Bay of Lübeck is expected to be repeated in other locations.

Between the late 1940s and the post-war period, 1.6m tons of arms were dumped off the German shoreline. Thousands of people loaded them in boats; a portion were dropped in specific areas, others just dumped while traveling. This is the first time researchers have recorded how marine life has responded.

Worldwide Instances of Ocean Adaptation

• In the US, retired energy installations have become marine habitats
• Submerged vessels from the World War I have become environments for wildlife along the Potomac in the state of Maryland
• Military vehicle parts that have become home to reef-building organisms off Asan in the Pacific island

These areas become even more crucial for marine life as the seas are increasingly depleted by commercial fishing, seafloor dredging and anchoring. Sunken ships and weapons dump sites effectively serve as refuges – they are not national parks, but virtually any kind of human activity is banned, explains Vedenin. Consequently a numerous of marine species that are usually rare or diminishing, such as the Baltic cod, are thriving.

Future Issues

Wherever military conflict has taken place in the last century, surrounding seas are usually littered with weapons, explains Vedenin. Millions of tons of explosive material lie in our oceans.

The sites of these explosives are insufficiently mapped, partly because of international boundaries, restricted military information and the reality that documents are buried in historic archives. They create an explosion and safety risk, as well as risk from the ongoing emission of hazardous substances.

As the German government and additional nations start removing these artifacts, researchers hope to safeguard the habitats that have formed around them. In the Bay of Lübeck explosives are presently being extracted.

It would be wise to replace these steel remains left from munitions with some less dangerous, various non-dangerous structures, like possibly concrete structures, suggests Vedenin.

He now aspires that what happens in the Bay of Lübeck establishes a example for substituting structures after weapon clearance in other locations – because including the most destructive armaments can become scaffolding for marine organisms.