WWII shipwrecks a 'ticking time bomb' for Federated States of Micronesia (1 Viewer)

SaparotRob said:

Isn't there a sunken Liberty ship, stuffed to the gunnels with explosives, close by London?

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EwenS said:

The SS Richard Montgomery with 1,400 tons still aboard. Safest route has been not to disturb them.

SS Richard Montgomery - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

There were some massive accidental explosions in WW2 from the mishandling of explosives. Port Chicago disaster, Fort Stikine at Bombay, Mount Hood at Manus and West Loch disaster at Pearl Harbor all without enemy intervention.

The USN has removed oil from the wreck of the Prinz Eugen at Kwajalein

US Navy completes oil removal from atomic bomb test ship

The US Navy's Supervisor of Salvage and Diving (SUPSALV) successfully removed 229,000 gallons of oil from the sunken World War

safety4sea.com

And some 1,600 tons were removed from the wreck of the Royal Oak at Scapa Flow about 20 years ago and the it continues to be monitored.

So recovery is possible. I suppose the first question is to whom do the wrecks belong today?

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Gnomey said:

Likely to be too unstable to do anything other than controlled explosion but that would risk damaging surrounding bits given the amount of explosives.

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