Thread by @fascinatorfun

That damn bridge again.

1.15 million tons (1.17 million tonnes) of conventional and chemical weapons known to have been dumped in the sea around Britain since WW2, a lot in and near Beauford’s Dyke.

2 tonnes of radioactive waste.

It gets worse.

https://twitter.com/davidheadviews/status/1226830983778963457

Despite British Gas trying to claim the ploughing operation was nothing to do with the beached and floating bombs in Firth of Clyde and Mull of Kintyre, scientists at the Scottish Marine Laboratory said that is wrong.

Beyond reasonable doubt.

More surveys needed

Many of the dumps never got to Beaufort’s Dyke with dumps in shallow waters a few hundred metres off shore en route to the Dyke by ships from Stranraer to Cumbria. Seamen from the dumping expeditions confirm this.

Look at the amount and type dumped over a period of decades!

The ministry dumped some 14 000 tons of 5-inch artillery rockets filled with poisonous phosgene gas in the trench July - Oct 1945. Over the next 3 years, it consigned 135k tons of conventional munitions there, and every year “into the late 1950s” another 20k tons in the dyke.

This is going to be not just a PR disaster
MoD claims of no evidence to suggest significant harm to human health or the marine environment is because they’ve not looked for them.

Whilst some active ingredients like phosgene might hydrolyse relatively harmlessly, not mustard gas

Statements from the MoD also reveal that between 1945 and 1957 it scuttled 24 ships packed with 137 000 tons of chemical weapons at two sites in the Atlantic. One is 1600 kilometres southwest of Land’s End, around Hurds Deep,

The other is a large area beginning 100 km NW of Northern Ireland & SE of Rockall Deep. 8 of the ships are sitting at depths of less than 2k metres
The shallowest is in 500 m of water. Both sites are also home to thousands of tons of radioactive waste from UK’s nuclear programme

“The material dumped in the Atlantic includes 17 000 tons of captured German bombs filled with the nerve gas tabun. The scientists at the Marine Laboratory in Aberdeen say that another nerve gas, sarin, together with phosgene, tear gas and mustard gas, have also been dumped.”

Remember the fish negotiations? Leaks could contaminate fish.

In the postwar years, the MoD chose its dumping zones partly because they were far away from commercial fisheries.

“Since then, however, declining populations of more easily caught species combined with advances in fishing technology have driven fishermen to further and deeper waters. Prawns are now fished just north of Beaufort’s Dyke and there is a hake fishery in the dyke itself.”

“Farther out to sea, fishermen trawl down to 1800 metres for deep sea species such as the orange roughy.”

Will testing and certification become not just routine but compelling.

Could it lead to fishing bans?

The untimate irony
Reclaim our waters only to scupper our fishing.

Comprehensive surveys of the dump areas are needed to find out what is in them and the state they are in.

If there are any doubts about safety the only thing that could be done is to ban fishing and underwater activity.

That is from marine pollution expert Paul Johnston

Something else strikes me about that map, and the stories about the extended dumping grounds.

Are Irish waters contaminated too?

What about issues of compensation?

I really don’t think the Gov has thought this through.

More a large exploding can of fish than worms.

Even the Mail rubbished the idea in Sept 2019 giving other reasons quite apart from the danger for dumping and the potential adverse consequences for fishing.

The length of the bridge. High winds
The depth of the foundations . 1k deep in parts.
Cost

dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7…