World War II Explosives, Torpedo Heads and Mines: How Ocean Creatures Flourishes on Discarded Armaments

In the slightly salty waters off the Germany's coast lies a collection of Nazi bombs, torpedo heads and mines. Thrown off vessels at the end of the second world war and neglected, thousands weapons have become matted together over the years. They comprise a corroding blanket on the shallow, muddy seafloor of the Lübeck Bay in the western tip of the Baltic.

Over the decades, the wartime weapons was overlooked and neglected. A growing number of tourists traveled to the sandy beaches and tranquil sea for water sports, kite surfing and entertainment venues. Below the waves, the weapons eroded.

Some of us thought to see a barren area, with no organisms because it was all poisoned, says Andrey Vedenin.

When the team went looking to see what they were doing to the marine environment, the team expected to see a desert, with no organisms because it was all toxic, explains a scientist.

What they observed astonished them. Vedenin recounts his team members exclaiming in amazement when the submersible first sent the images back. That moment was a remarkable experience, he notes.

Numerous of sea creatures had established habitats amid the weapons, creating a revitalized habitat more populous than the sea floor surrounding it.

This marine city was proof to the resilience of life. Truly surprising how much marine organisms we observe in places that are considered dangerous and risky, he says.

More than 40 starfish had piled on to one accessible chunk of TNT. They were dwelling on metal shells, fuse pockets and carrying containers just a short distance from its volatile core. Fish, crabs, sea anemones and mussels were all discovered on the historic weapons. It resembles a marine reef in terms of the amount of creatures that was inhabiting the area, says Vedenin.

Remarkable Population Density

An average of more than 40,000 animals were dwelling on every meter squared of the weapons, scientists reported in their paper on the finding. The adjacent region was much poorer in life, with only 8,000 individuals on every square metre.

It is paradoxical that items that are designed to destroy all life are attracting so much marine organisms, states Vedenin. You can see how nature adapts after a major disaster such as the World War II and how, in certain respects, life establishes itself to the most dangerous locations.

Man-made Features as Ocean Environments

Artificial structures such as sunken vessels, offshore windfarms, oil rigs and pipelines can create substitutes, restoring some of the removed marine environment. This study reveals that weapons could be equally advantageous – the bloom of marine organisms on those in the Lübeck Bay is likely to be repeated in different areas.

Between 1946 and 1948, 1.6m tons of munitions were disposed of off the Germany's coast. Thousands of individuals loaded them in boats; a portion were deposited in allocated sites, others just thrown overboard while traveling. This is the first time scientists have documented how ocean organisms has responded.

Global Examples of Ocean Adaptation

• In the United States, decommissioned drilling platforms have turned into marine habitats
• Shipwrecks from the World War I have become environments for marine life along the Potomac in Maryland
• Military vehicle parts that have become habitat to coral off Asan in the Pacific island

These areas become even more important for wildlife as the seas are increasingly stripped by commercial fishing, bottom trawling and anchoring. Sunken ships and munitions areas effectively act as refuges – they are not national parks, but nearly any kind of anthropogenic disturbance is restricted, says Vedenin. Therefore a lot of marine species that are typically rare or declining, such as the cod fish, are thriving.

Future Factors

Anywhere armed conflict has happened in the recent history, nearby oceans are often strewn with explosives, says Vedenin. Millions of tons of volatile compounds lie in our marine environments.

The locations of these explosives are poorly recorded, in part because of sovereign limits, classified armed forces records and the fact that records are hidden in old files. They present an explosion and safety risk, as well as threat from the persistent release of hazardous substances.

As Germany and other countries start clearing these remains, scientists hope to safeguard the ecosystems that have developed nearby. In the Lübeck Bay explosives are currently being cleared.

It would be wise to replace these metal carcasses remaining from munitions with certain safer, some safe objects, like possibly man-made habitats, suggests Vedenin.

He presently aspires that what happens in Lübeck creates a example for substituting habitats after munitions removal in other locations – because even the most destructive explosives can become scaffolding for ocean ecosystems.