Ideas to recover ammunition from Swiss lakes flood in

Hundreds of proposals for ammunition recovery in lakes Keystone-SDA

An appeal to the public to suggest ways to safely retrieve 8,000 tons of munitions from the bottom of Swiss lakes has yielded around 100 proposals.

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The three best projects submitted to the Federal Armament Office (armasuisse) could serve as a basis for further decisions, and win a CHF50,000 prize if accepted. A decision will be made by a panel of experts in May.

Recovering sunken munitions at a depth of 150 to 220 metres is a complex operation. In addition to depth, additional challenges include poor visibility, risk of explosions, current, varying size (from 4mm to 20cm in size, 0.4g to 50kg in weight) as well as the characteristics of the munitions.

+ Swiss army vigilant about sunken munitions

The ordnance are also encased in fine sediments up to two metres thick, which, during salvage operations, could shift, making the waters murky and further worsening visibility. Most ammunition components are made of iron and are therefore magnetic. However, some detonators are composed of non-magnetic materials such as copper, brass or aluminum.

In the Bernese lakes of Thun and Brienz alone, and in Lake Lucerne, there are still about 8,000 tons of military munitions sunk between 1918 and 1964.

Image problem

According to the results of a monitoring carried out in the summer of 2019 by the Federal Department of Defense, munitions dumps in the above mentioned lakes are not hazardous to the waters.

Until the mid-20th century, the military dumped ammunition and other items into several Swiss lakes. It was common practice to dispose of ammunition in this way.

In June 2022, the Swiss Federal Audit Office (SFAO) had concluded that the problem poses a financial as well as an image risk to the federal government.

The costs for analysis, surveillance and remediation were estimated at several hundred million francs. According to the Federal Office for the Environment, the sites should be cleaned up by 2040.

Translated from Italian with DeepL/mga

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