Scientists have discovered that marine life thought to be rare or on the verge of extinction is now thriving on and around ship and plane wrecks at the bottom of the sea around the island.

Several species of fishes, lobsters, sponges, corals and sea urchins have been considered rare since British rule and have been observed in Maltese waters in very few numbers.

Scuba divers have been complaining for years that they see less marine life every year.

But it turns out the sunken vessels and warplanes are teeming with these fishes and corals in a phenomenon that scientists are still trying to wrap their heads around.

University of Malta associate professor of Maritime Archaeology, Timmy Gambin, said researchers were excited to witness entire ship decks and plane wings covered in marine life that is only seen in few numbers elsewhere.

He said scientists are pondering the possibility that the vessels’ and planes’ paint and metal alloy caused chemical reactions that created the perfect haven for these species to thrive over decades.

“You have to understand that most of the sites we’re speaking about were a desert. There was no sign of life there before the ship or the plane hit the bottom of the sea. It is still mysterious how all of these rare life forms formed from a chunk of metal resting on a seabed covered in sand,” he explained.

“These wrecks somehow caused the phenomenon to occur through the formation of bacteria and several chemical reactions, but we have not yet understood what caused these vessels and planes to become so intensely colonised over the decades.

“This means the metal on the ships and the planes could be a better habitat to these species than the natural rocky reefs, and we still don’t understand entirely why.”

One of the guns from the British navy ship HMS Southwold covered in corals. The ship was sunken in World War II as it was escorting a convoy of goods to Malta. Photo: Heritage Malta

Gambin also heads Heritage Malta’s Underwater Cultural Heritage Unit.

Together with his colleagues and the Superintendence for Cultural Heritage, he has embarked on a one-of-a-kind quest to collect data from the underwater sites in an attempt to establish what species exist there, their populations and the reasons why they congregate and flourish the way they do.

17 protected underwater cultural heritage sites

The seabed around the islands is peppered with shipwrecks that date back all the way to the Phoenician era.

There are World War II wrecks, including Nazi ones, and Cold War bomber planes.

Heritage Malta and the superintendence have so far declared 17 of them as protected underwater cultural heritage sites, prohibiting fishing and other marine activity in and around them.

Gambin said that life in and around older ships and planes is even richer because they have been resting on the seabed for far longer than more modern artificial wrecks.

The older ones offer a clear indication of the lifeline of the species because it is known exactly when they sank, “so we know when life began to form on them”, he said.

The sites are situated at depths of between 55 and 100 metres. Some of them are even deeper and can only be visited by specially trained technical divers.

But Gambin said the sites are increasingly becoming an attraction to diver tourists and he envisages an even bigger international interest in the near future.

As for the thousands of people who will never get the chance to see the sites in person, Gambin’s team have launched a website – underwatermalta.org – an interactive, online museum where people can navigate around the sunken ships and planes from the comfort of their homes.

“These sites are fascinating, and the best way to preserve them is to create awareness about them. That is our aim,” Gambin said.

“And what may be most fascinating about them is, that these planes and ships that were built to destroy life are now sanctuaries of it.”

Researchers had previously thought the species were relatively rare only to realise they were thriving on and around shipwrecks and sunken war planes. Photo: Heritage Malta/A. Sant