In the slightly salty waters off the German shoreline sits a collection of Nazi bombs, torpedo heads and naval mines. Discarded from boats at the end of the World War II and left behind, thousands munitions have become matted together over the years. They form a decaying layer on the shallow, silty seafloor of the Lübeck Bay in the western part of the Baltic.
Over the decades, the Nazi arsenal was overlooked and neglected. A increasing amount of tourists flocked to the coastal areas and calm waters for jetskiing, kite surfing and entertainment venues. Beneath the surface, the weapons decayed.
We initially expected to see a desert, with no life because it was all contaminated, says a scientist.
When the team went investigating 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 a scientist.
What they discovered surprised them. Vedenin recounts his team members reacting with shock when the underwater vehicle first transmitted footage. It was a remarkable experience, he notes.
Numerous of sea creatures had made their homes amid the weapons, developing a renewed marine community richer than the sea floor around it.
This ocean community was testament to the tenacity of life. It is actually astonishing how much marine organisms we find in places that are supposed to be hazardous and risky, he explains.
Over 40 starfish had clustered on to one visible fragment of TNT. They were living on steel casings, ignition chambers and carrying containers just a short distance from its explosive filling. Fish, crustaceans, sea anemones and bivalves were all found on the historic weapons. You could compare it with a reef ecosystem in terms of the amount of animal life that was present, says Vedenin.
An average of more than forty thousand creatures were residing on every square metre of the munitions, researchers documented in their research on the finding. The surrounding area was much poorer in life, with only 8,000 creatures on every square metre.
It is surprising that items that are designed to destroy everything are attracting so much marine organisms, explains Vedenin. You can see how the natural world adapts after a devastating occurrence such as the World War II and how, in some way, marine life returns to the most dangerous places.
Artificial features such as sunken vessels, wind turbines, drilling platforms and undersea pipes can provide alternatives, compensating for some of the removed marine environment. This research reveals that explosives could be similarly advantageous – the explosion of life on those in the Lübeck Bay is expected to be found in different areas.
Between the late 1940s and 1948, 1.6m tons of weapons were dumped off the Germany's coast. Numerous of individuals placed them in boats; some were deposited in allocated areas, the remainder just dumped while traveling. This is the first time researchers have studied how ocean organisms has reacted.
These areas become even more important for organisms as the marine environments are increasingly depleted by fishing, seafloor dredging and boat mooring. Sunken ships and explosive disposal locations effectively act as sanctuaries – they are not national parks, but virtually any kind of human activity is prohibited, explains Vedenin. As a result a many of marine species that are typically uncommon or decreasing, such as the cod fish, are thriving.
Anywhere warfare has occurred in the last century, nearby oceans are usually containing weapons, states Vedenin. Millions of tonnes of dangerous substances lie in our seas.
The sites of these weapons are inadequately mapped, in part because of national borders, restricted military information and the fact that archives are stored in historical records. They create an explosion and safety risk, as well as danger from the ongoing emission of toxic chemicals.
As Germany and additional nations start clearing these relics, scientists plan to safeguard the ecosystems that have established nearby. In the Lübeck Bay explosives are presently being extracted.
Researchers recommend substitute these metal carcasses remaining from weapons with certain less dangerous, various harmless objects, like possibly artificial reefs, suggests Vedenin.
He currently aspires that what occurs in the Bay of Lübeck sets a precedent for substituting material after munitions removal in different areas – because including the most destructive weaponry can become scaffolding for marine organisms.
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