Nazi Munitions, Torpedo Heads and Mines: How Ocean Creatures Prosper on Dumped Armaments

In the brackish sea off the German coast sits a wasteland of World War II explosives, torpedoes and mines. Discarded from boats at the conclusion of the second world war and neglected, countless explosives have become matted together over the decades. They create a rusting layer on the low-depth, muddy seafloor of the Lübeck Bay in the western tip of the Baltic Sea.

Over the decades, the explosive stockpile was ignored and neglected. A growing number of visitors flocked to the sandy beaches and tranquil sea for water sports, kiteboarding and entertainment venues. Underwater, the weapons eroded.

Researchers thought to see a lifeless zone, with no life because it was all poisoned, states the lead researcher.

When the initial researchers went searching to see what they were doing to the ecosystem, the team expected to see a barren area, with no life because it was all toxic, says Andrey Vedenin.

What they discovered amazed them. Vedenin recalls his team members reacting with shock when the submersible first relayed pictures. This was a memorable occasion, he says.

Numerous of sea creatures had established habitats on the weapons, forming a renewed marine community denser than the ocean bottom surrounding it.

This marine city was testament to the persistence of marine life. Truly surprising how much life we observe in areas that are considered dangerous and harmful, he explains.

Over 40 starfish had clustered on to one visible chunk of explosive material. They were dwelling on iron containers, detonator compartments and carrying containers just centimetres from its volatile core. Fish, crustaceans, anemones and bivalves were all observed on the discarded explosives. You could compare it with a coral reef in terms of the quantity of creatures that was there, notes Vedenin.

Remarkable Creature Concentration

An average of more than forty thousand animals were residing on every square metre of the explosives, experts documented in their paper on the discovery. The adjacent region was much sparser, with only eight thousand individuals on every meter squared.

It is ironic that things that are meant to eliminate all life are hosting so much marine organisms, says Vedenin. It's evident how nature evolves after a devastating occurrence such as the World War II and how, in certain respects, marine life establishes itself to the most risky places.

Artificial Structures as Marine Habitats

Man-made constructions such as shipwrecks, offshore windfarms, drilling platforms and pipelines can provide replacements, compensating for some of the destroyed marine environment. This research demonstrates that munitions could be equally beneficial – the explosion of marine organisms on those in the Bay of Lübeck is expected to be repeated in different areas.

Between 1946 and the post-war period, 1.6m tons of arms were disposed of off the Germany's shoreline. Countless of individuals transported them in vessels; a portion were deposited in designated areas, the remainder just dumped en route. This is the first time experts have recorded how marine life has responded.

Worldwide Examples of Ocean Adaptation

• In the US, decommissioned energy installations have turned into reef ecosystems
• Sunken ships from the World War I have become habitats for wildlife along the Potomac in the state of Maryland
• Tank tracks that have become habitat to coral off Asan in the Pacific island

These places become even more valuable for organisms as the marine environments are increasingly denuded by commercial fishing, bottom trawling and boat mooring. Sunken ships and explosive disposal locations essentially function as refuges – they are not national parks, but virtually any kind of anthropogenic disturbance is prohibited, explains Vedenin. As a result a lot of species that are otherwise rare or diminishing, such as the Baltic cod, are thriving.

Future Issues

Anywhere armed conflict has happened in the recent history, adjacent waters are typically strewn with weapons, explains Vedenin. Millions of tons of dangerous substances lie in our oceans.

The locations of these weapons are inadequately mapped, in part because of international boundaries, restricted armed forces records and the reality that records are stored in historic archives. They pose an detonation and safety risk, as well as threat from the ongoing leakage of hazardous substances.

As the German government and different states embark on extracting these artifacts, scientists hope to safeguard the marine communities that have established around them. In the Bay of Lübeck explosives are already being extracted.

It would be wise to replace these metal carcasses left from munitions with some more secure, some non-dangerous structures, like maybe concrete structures, suggests Vedenin.

He presently aspires that what occurs in Lübeck sets a precedent for replacing material after weapon clearance in other locations – because including the most harmful explosives can become scaffolding for ocean ecosystems.