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UXO Marks the Spot

November 9, 2018

Unexploded ordnance (UXO) from the 1940s and 50s can sometimes resurface in the surf or wash up on beaches at former U.S. military coastal training ranges as the coast erodes. WHOI coastal oceanographer Peter Traykovski is working to find UXO and to predict how storm-generated waves might move it around. Here, the white tube is a surrogate UXO that Traykovski (left), Giorgio Caramanna (center, holding the tube), and Kevin Manganini (in the boat) are releasing into the surf at Long Point Wildlife Reserve on Cape Cod to track its motion during storms. The munitions response project is funded by the U.S. Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program. (Photo by Sean Patrick Whelan, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)