Nazi Explosives, Torpedoes and Naval Mines: How Marine Life Thrives on Dumped Weapons

In the slightly salty waters off the German shoreline rests a wasteland of Nazi bombs, torpedoes and naval mines. Dumped from barges at the end of the second world war and left behind, thousands explosives have become matted together over the decades. They comprise a corroding layer on the low-depth, silty seafloor of the Lübeck Bay in the western part of the Baltic.

Over the years, the Nazi arsenal was ignored and forgotten about. A growing number of visitors traveled to the sandy beaches and calm waters for jetskiing, kiteboarding and amusement parks. Underwater, the munitions deteriorated.

Researchers thought to see a desert, with no organisms because it was all contaminated, states the lead researcher.

When the first scientists went investigating to see what they were affecting to the ecosystem, researchers expected to see a barren area, with nothing living there because it was all poisoned, says a scientist.

What they discovered surprised them. Vedenin recounts his colleagues reacting with shock when the ROV first sent the images back. That moment was a memorable occasion, he recalls.

Countless of sea creatures had made their homes among the weapons, creating a renewed habitat more populous than the seabed around it.

This marine city was proof to the persistence of life. Indeed astonishing how much marine organisms we discover in areas that are expected to be hazardous and harmful, he says.

Over 40 sea stars had piled on to one visible fragment of explosive material. They were residing on steel casings, fuse pockets and storage boxes just centimetres from its volatile core. Fish, crabs, sea anemones and bivalves were all found on the historic weapons. It resembles a reef ecosystem in terms of the abundance of fauna that was inhabiting the area, says Vedenin.

Surprising Creature Concentration

An average of more than 40,000 organisms were residing on every meter squared of the munitions, scientists reported in their study on the discovery. The nearby seabed was much less diverse, with only eight thousand individuals on every square metre.

It is paradoxical that items that are meant to destroy everything are hosting so much life, says Vedenin. One can observe how nature adapts after a catastrophic event such as the World War II and how, in certain respects, marine life establishes itself to the most risky locations.

Artificial Structures as Ocean Environments

Artificial constructions such as shipwrecks, offshore windfarms, drilling platforms and pipelines can create substitutes, replacing some of the removed habitat. This investigation shows that munitions could be equally positive – the proliferation of life on those in the Bay of Lübeck is expected to be duplicated in other locations.

Between 1946 and the post-war period, 1.6m tonnes of arms were disposed of off the German coast. Numerous of workers placed them in barges; a portion were dropped in specific locations, the remainder just discarded at sea en route. This is the first time researchers have documented how ocean organisms has reacted.

Global Instances of Marine Adaptation

• In the United States, retired drilling platforms have turned into reef ecosystems
• Shipwrecks from the first world war have become habitats for marine life along the Potomac River in the state of Maryland
• Tank tracks that have become home to coral off Asan in the Pacific island

These locations become even more valuable for organisms as the oceans are increasingly depleted by fishing, seafloor dredging and boat mooring. Shipwrecks and weapons dump sites essentially serve as protected areas – they are not official reserves, but nearly any kind of human activity is prohibited, says Vedenin. Consequently a many of species that are usually scarce or diminishing, such as the Baltic cod, are prospering.

Future Considerations

Anywhere armed conflict has happened in the recent history, surrounding seas are usually littered with explosives, states Vedenin. Many millions of tons of volatile compounds lie in our marine environments.

The sites of these explosives are inadequately mapped, in part because of sovereign limits, classified defense data and the situation that archives are stored in historical records. They create an detonation and safety danger, as well as danger from the persistent release of poisonous compounds.

As Germany and different states embark on extracting these artifacts, experts aim to preserve the marine communities that have formed around them. In the Bay of Lübeck explosives are already being removed.

Researchers recommend replace these iron structures remaining from munitions with some less dangerous, some safe materials, like maybe artificial reefs, says Vedenin.

He currently aspires that what happens in the Bay of Lübeck creates a example for substituting material after explosive extraction in different areas – because including the most harmful armaments can become framework for ocean ecosystems.