Nazi Explosives, Torpedo Heads and Naval Mines: How Marine Life Flourishes on Abandoned Weapons

In the brackish sea off the German shoreline lies a graveyard of Nazi bombs, torpedoes and naval mines. Discarded from boats at the conclusion of the second world war and left behind, numerous munitions have become matted together over the years. They create a decaying blanket on the low-depth, silty seafloor of the Bay of Lübeck in the western tip of the Baltic Sea.

Over the decades, the explosive stockpile was overlooked and neglected. A growing number of tourists traveled to the coastal areas and calm waters for jetskiing, kite surfing and entertainment venues. Underwater, the weapons decayed.

We initially expected to see a desert, with no life because it was all poisoned, states the lead researcher.

When the initial researchers went looking to see what they were doing to the ecosystem, some of us expected to see a desert, with no organisms because it was all contaminated, states the lead researcher.

What they found surprised them. Vedenin recalls his colleagues reacting with shock when the underwater vehicle first sent the images back. That moment was a remarkable experience, he recalls.

Numerous of ocean life had made their homes amid the munitions, forming a regenerated marine community denser than the ocean bottom nearby.

This underwater metropolis was evidence to the resilience of marine life. It is actually surprising how much life we find in places that are supposed to be dangerous and risky, he says.

Over 40 starfish had gathered on to one visible chunk of TNT. They were living on metal shells, ignition chambers and transport cases just centimetres from its explosive filling. Fish, crabs, anemones and mussels were all observed on the discarded explosives. You could compare it with a marine reef in terms of the quantity of creatures that was there, notes Vedenin.

Surprising Creature Concentration

An mean of more than forty thousand organisms were living on every meter squared of the weapons, scientists wrote in their study on the discovery. The adjacent region was much sparser, with only eight thousand creatures on every meter squared.

It is ironic that objects that are designed to destroy all life are drawing so much life, states Vedenin. It's evident how nature adapts after a devastating occurrence such as the World War II and how, in certain respects, life finds its way to the most dangerous places.

Artificial Features as Marine Habitats

Artificial constructions such as sunken vessels, wind turbines, drilling platforms and undersea pipes can provide substitutes, restoring some of the destroyed marine environment. This research reveals that explosives could be comparably beneficial – the explosion of marine organisms on those in the Bay of Lübeck is likely to be repeated in different areas.

Between 1946 and the post-war period, 1.6 million tons of weapons were disposed of off the German coast. Countless of individuals placed them in boats; some were deposited in allocated locations, others just discarded at sea during transport. This is the first time experts have recorded how ocean organisms has adapted.

Global Instances of Marine Adaptation

• In the US, retired oil and gas structures have become coral reefs
• Submerged vessels from the first world war have become homes for creatures along the Potomac in the state of Maryland
• Military vehicle parts that have become home to coral off Asan beach in the Pacific island

These locations become even more important for organisms as the oceans are increasingly denuded by fishing, seafloor dredging and boat mooring. Shipwrecks and explosive disposal locations essentially function as sanctuaries – they are not national parks, but almost any kind of anthropogenic disturbance is prohibited, says Vedenin. As a result a lot of organisms that are typically uncommon or diminishing, such as the cod fish, are prospering.

Coming Considerations

Wherever military conflict has taken place in the last century, surrounding seas are typically strewn with munitions, says Vedenin. Millions of tonnes of dangerous substances rest in our seas.

The positions of these explosives are insufficiently mapped, partly because of international boundaries, secret military information and the reality that archives are stored in old files. They present an explosion and security danger, as well as risk from the continuous emission of hazardous substances.

As the German government and different states embark on clearing these artifacts, scientists aim to protect the ecosystems that have developed around them. In the Lübeck Bay weapons are currently being removed.

We should replace these metal carcasses originating from munitions with some safer, some safe structures, like perhaps concrete structures, suggests Vedenin.

He presently aspires that what occurs in the Bay of Lübeck creates a model for replacing structures after explosive extraction in other locations – because even the most destructive explosives can become framework for ocean ecosystems.