Nazi Explosives, Torpedoes and Mines: The Way Ocean Creatures Thrives on Abandoned Armaments

In the brackish waters off the German coast sits a graveyard of Nazi bombs, torpedoes and naval mines. Thrown off boats at the conclusion of the second world war and neglected, thousands munitions have fused into clusters over the decades. They form a decaying layer on the low-depth, silty ocean floor 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 tourists came to the sandy beaches and tranquil sea for water sports, kite surfing and amusement parks. Below the waves, the weapons decayed.

Researchers expected to see a lifeless zone, with no organisms because it was all toxic, explains a scientist.

When the first scientists went searching to see what they were affecting to the marine environment, researchers thought they would find a lifeless zone, with nothing living there because it was all toxic, says Andrey Vedenin.

What they observed surprised them. Vedenin recounts his team members reacting with shock when the submersible first transmitted footage. It was a memorable occasion, he says.

Numerous of marine animals had established habitats on the explosives, creating a revitalized ecosystem more populous than the seabed around it.

This ocean community was proof to the persistence of marine life. Indeed astonishing how much marine organisms we discover in places that are considered hazardous and dangerous, he explains.

In excess of 40 starfish had gathered on to one accessible fragment of TNT. They were living on metal shells, ignition chambers and storage boxes just centimetres from its volatile core. Marine fish, crabs, sea anemones and mussels were all observed on the historic weapons. It resembles a reef ecosystem in terms of the quantity of creatures that was inhabiting the area, says Vedenin.

Remarkable Population Density

An mean of more than 40,000 organisms were dwelling on every square metre of the weapons, experts documented in their research on the observation. The nearby seabed was much less diverse, with only 8,000 creatures on every meter squared.

It is ironic that objects that are intended to eliminate everything are attracting so much life, says Vedenin. It's evident how nature adapts after a catastrophic event such as the second world war and how, in certain respects, marine life establishes itself to the most dangerous places.

Man-made Features as Ocean Environments

Man-made constructions such as shipwrecks, wind turbines, drilling platforms and pipelines can create substitutes, compensating for some of the lost marine environment. This study shows that explosives could be similarly beneficial – the bloom of life on those in the Bay of Lübeck is likely to be found in different areas.

Between 1946 and 1948, 1.6 million tonnes of weapons were disposed of off the Germany's shoreline. Countless of people placed them in barges; a portion were placed in allocated sites, the remainder just thrown overboard en route. This is the initial instance scientists have documented how marine life has reacted.

Global Examples of Ocean Adaptation

• In the US, retired drilling platforms have turned into marine habitats
• Sunken ships from the first world war have become habitats for creatures along the Potomac in the state of Maryland
• Military vehicle parts that have become environment to reef-building organisms off Asan beach in the Pacific island

These locations become even more valuable for organisms as the oceans are increasingly denuded by fishing, bottom trawling and boat mooring. Sunken ships and weapons dump sites essentially act as protected areas – they are not national parks, but virtually any kind of human activity is prohibited, says Vedenin. Consequently a many of species that are usually rare or decreasing, such as the cod fish, are flourishing.

Coming Factors

Anywhere military conflict has taken place in the past 100 years, nearby oceans are typically strewn with explosives, says Vedenin. Many millions of tons of explosive material remain in our seas.

The positions of these munitions are inadequately mapped, partially because of national borders, classified military information and the situation that documents are stored in historical records. They present an detonation and safety hazard, as well as danger from the persistent leakage of toxic chemicals.

As the German government and other countries begin extracting these remains, scientists plan to preserve the marine communities that have formed nearby. In the Bay of Lübeck weapons are currently being removed.

We should replace these steel remains originating from weapons with some safer, some safe materials, like perhaps concrete structures, suggests Vedenin.

He currently aspires that what occurs in Lübeck creates a model for substituting material after explosive extraction in different areas – because even the most destructive explosives can become scaffolding for ocean ecosystems.