Text 18596, 37 rader
Skriven 2008-06-26 22:16:28 av Robert Bashe (2:2448/44)
  Kommentar till text 18231 av Ward Dossche (2:292/854)
Ärende: the Baltic
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Ward Dossche wrote to Bob Ackley on Thursday June 26 2008 at 14:04:

WD> Second, chemical weaponry need not be a problem by definition if the
WD> site is monitored well enough, kept clear from activity and the
WD> ordnance be allowed to deteriorate at a modest pace releasing its
WD> chemicals only gradually.

Unfortunately, we're talking about the Baltic, not the Atlantic. And aside from
the lack of monitoring, the lack of information as to whether the stuff is
really clear from activity and the impossibility of having any influence on the
rate of deterioration (whereby the castings rust through, but the chemicals are
generally in fine shape even 50 years later), we've also got the major problem
that the rate of water exchange in the Baltic is extremely low and thus
anything that escapes tends to concentrate there.

WD> Reaction with seawater may create gases which dissolve in the water
WD> and as a single result create a temporary low, or no, oxygen area ...
WD> not good for animal life but in any case nothing of a permanent fatal
WD> nature.

Again, this is the Baltic. And the chemicals in chemical munitions don't cause
a reduction in the oxygen level of the water (unless you're just thinking of
the casings rusting)... when they do escape, they create all sorts of nasty
things such as mutations and possible enrichment of toxins in fish, and in at
least one case I read of physical harm to swimmers. Lewisite, one of the
chemical agents, contains arsenic.

If all this was in the Atlantic, there would be much less of a problem. Even
the North Sea would be better, since the rate of water exchange is higher. But
the Baltic was about the worst possible place to dump munitions, as we now know
by hindsight.  Now the only question is when the problems will start becoming
acute, not _if_ there will be acute problems.

Cheers, Bob

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