World War II Nerve Gas dumped at sea poses risk

international | environment | other press

Monday October 31, 2005 01:00

by Terry

Old canisisters beginning to wash up

This story describes how after World War II, millions of tonnes of nerve gas weapons were dumped at sea off the US. Apparently now it is beginning to wash up and much of the containers would be corroded by now.

Also worth noting, but NOT covered in the news report is that there are millions of tonnes of munitions (incendinary bombs -phosphorous ) dumped in the Irish Sea between the UK and the Isle of Man and a few years back, some of it washed up off Wicklow and Wexford.

The munitions were supposed to be dumped in some relatively deep trench there, but an investigation that took to people who worked on the ships say they often didn't bother go out all the rate and the stuff got dumped in shallow water too.
This probably applies in the US case too -below

For the case of muntions dumped in the Irish Sea and elsewhere, see:
Deep, but not deep enough: Where the real nasties lurk
http://www.divernet.com/safety/nasty598.htm

But here's some extracts from the main report for which this story was published -at the URL: below
'The Deadliness Below'
'Weapons of mass destruction thrown into the sea years ago present danger now - and the Army doesn't know where they all are'

In the summer of 2004, a clam-dredging operation off New Jersey pulled up an old artillery shell.

The long-submerged World War I-era explosive was filled with a black tarlike substance.

Bomb disposal technicians from Dover Air Force Base, Del., were brought in to dismantle it. Three of them were injured - one hospitalized with large pus-filled blisters on an arm and hand.

The shell was filled with mustard gas in solid form.

... AND ...

The Army now admits that it secretly dumped 64 million pounds of nerve and mustard agents into the sea, along with 400,000 chemical-filled bombs, land mines and rockets and more than 500 tons of radioactive waste - either tossed overboard or packed into the holds of scuttled vessels.

.... AND ....

A drop of nerve agent can kill within a minute. When released in the ocean, it lasts up to six weeks, killing every organism it touches before breaking down into its nonlethal chemical components.

Mustard gas can be fatal. When exposed to seawater, it forms a concentrated, encrusted gel that lasts for at least five years, rolling around on the ocean floor, killing or contaminating sea life.

Sea-dumped chemical weapons might be slowly leaking from decades of saltwater corrosion, resulting in a time-delayed release of deadly chemicals over the next 100 years and an unforeseeable environmental effect. Steel corrodes at different rates, depending on the water depth, ocean temperature and thickness of the shells.

... AND .....

The first documented dump near that state was in March 1946, when four railroad cars full of mustard gas bombs and mines were tossed over the side of the USS Diamond Head, an ammunition ship.

Several months later, an estimated 23 barges full of German-produced nerve gas bombs and U.S.-made Lewisite bombs were dumped in the same location. Lewisite is a blister agent akin to mustard gas. A single barge carried up to 350 tons.

"If we don't have any idea of depths of water or location, hell, they could be anywhere," Farmer said. "As we have more and more activity and more and more development off the coast, I hope this was buried in 6,000 feet of water ... or a lot of this stuff is going to come back to haunt us."

There's one indication that those weapons were dumped in relatively shallow water: Army records show many of those 23 slow-moving barges were unloaded in one-day, out-and-back operations.

The records leave no doubt that other chemical weapons were dumped close to shore:

In 1944, at least 16,000 mustard-filled 100-pound bombs were unloaded off Hawaii in deep water only five miles from shore.

Several mustard gas bombs fell into the Mississippi River near Braithwaite, La., in 1945 and have never been found.

A reported 124 leaking German mustard gas bombs were tossed in the Gulf of Mexico off Horn Island in Mississippi in 1946 from a barge that returned to port a few hours later. The island is now part of Gulf Islands National Seashore, a popular vacation and fishing destination.

A 1947 dumpsite in Alaska's Aleutian Islands is only 12 miles from a harbor.