WWII Era Sea Mine Found During NATO Patrol

Sardinia, Italy The British mine hunting ship HMS Ledbury was on patrol as part of a NATO task force when its sonar picked up a target on the sea floor just off the coast from Cagliari. An ROV was dispatched to investigate the target. When the video image came back of the find, the sailors had trouble at first identifying the target due to an excessive amount of sea growth. A decision was made to dispatch divers to manually investigate the target.

Divers reported back that the target was a live high explosive filled WWII era sea mine (type not reported) that had become un-anchored and eventually sunk to sea floor. Concerned that the sea mine could be threat to fishermen and other vessels should it be moved in rough seas, an underwater disposal operation was carried out.

Italian Coastguard ships kept boat traffic out of the temporary exclusion zone as the mine was safely disposed of by British and Italian military experts.