World War II Munitions, Torpedoes and Mines: How Marine Life Thrives on Abandoned Armaments

In the slightly salty waters off the Germany's coast sits a wasteland of Nazi bombs, torpedoes and naval mines. Dumped from barges at the end of the World War II and neglected, countless explosives have become matted together over the decades. They form a rusting carpet on the shallow, silty ocean floor of the Bay of Lübeck in the western tip of the Baltic Sea.

Over the years, the Nazi arsenal was ignored and neglected. A growing number of tourists traveled to the sandy beaches and calm waters for jetskiing, kiteboarding and amusement parks. Beneath the surface, the munitions decayed.

We initially thought to see a lifeless zone, with no life because it was all toxic, states a scientist.

When the first scientists went searching to see what they were affecting to the marine environment, researchers thought they would find a desert, with no organisms because it was all contaminated, says a scientist.

What they found amazed them. Vedenin recalls his colleagues shouting with surprise when the submersible first relayed pictures. It was a great moment, he notes.

Thousands of ocean life had established habitats amid the explosives, forming a revitalized ecosystem richer than the seabed surrounding it.

This ocean community was evidence to the persistence of life. Indeed remarkable how much life we find in locations that are expected to be dangerous and dangerous, he says.

More than 40 sea stars had gathered on to one exposed chunk of TNT. They were dwelling on iron containers, fuse pockets and transport cases just centimetres from its dangerous content. Fish, crabs, anemones and bivalves were all discovered on the old munitions. It resembles a reef ecosystem in terms of the abundance of creatures that was there, says Vedenin.

Surprising Population Density

An mean of more than forty thousand organisms were residing on every meter squared of the weapons, experts reported in their paper on the discovery. The adjacent region was much poorer in life, with only 8,000 individuals on every meter squared.

It is ironic that things that are meant to destroy all life are drawing so much life, says Vedenin. You can see how nature adapts after a catastrophic event such as the World War II and how, in some way, life finds its way to the most risky areas.

Man-made Features as Marine Environments

Man-made structures such as sunken vessels, wind turbines, oil rigs and undersea pipes can offer substitutes, compensating for some of the removed marine environment. This research shows that munitions could be similarly beneficial – the explosion of life on those in the Bay of Lübeck is expected to be repeated in different areas.

Between the late 1940s and 1948, 1.6m tons of weapons were discarded off the German coast. Countless of individuals transported them in boats; a portion were placed in designated areas, others just thrown overboard during transport. This is the initial instance scientists have documented how ocean organisms has responded.

Global Instances of Marine Transformation

• In the US, decommissioned oil and gas structures have become coral reefs
• Sunken ships from the first world war have become habitats for marine life along the Potomac River in Maryland
• Military vehicle parts that have become habitat to coral off Asan in Guam

These places become even more important for organisms as the seas are increasingly depleted by commercial fishing, seafloor dredging and anchoring. Shipwrecks and munitions areas practically function as refuges – they are not official reserves, but almost any kind of human activity is banned, explains Vedenin. Consequently a many of organisms that are typically scarce or diminishing, such as the cod fish, are thriving.

Future Factors

Wherever armed conflict has taken place in the past 100 years, adjacent waters are typically littered with explosives, says Vedenin. Many millions of tons of volatile compounds remain in our seas.

The positions of these weapons are insufficiently documented, partially because of national borders, classified defense data and the fact that records are buried in old files. They pose an explosion and safety hazard, as well as danger from the persistent release of hazardous substances.

As Germany and additional nations embark on removing these remains, scientists hope to safeguard the habitats that have formed in their vicinity. In the Bay of Lübeck weapons are currently being removed.

We should substitute these iron structures originating from weapons with some less dangerous, some safe structures, like maybe concrete structures, says Vedenin.

He currently hopes that what occurs in Lübeck sets a precedent for substituting material after explosive extraction elsewhere – because also the most destructive armaments can become framework for marine organisms.