Story Posted 2 September , 2012 Share Posted 2 September , 2012 Some of the more than 200 pieces of World War I ammunition which emerged from a melting glacier on a Trentino mountain peak are seen, Aug. 31. Each piece weighs between 7-10 kilos, and the 85-100 mm caliber explosive devices were found at an altitude of 3,200 meters, when a once-perennial glacier on the Ago de Nardis peak partially melted due to a recent heat wave that reached into Italy's highest peaks. The Finance Police Alpine rescue unit, operating in the area between Pinzolo and Madonna di Campiglio, saw brownish metal points emerging from the ice, got a fix on them via GPS, and then extricated the ordnance. The pieces were spread over a 100-square-meter area during series of battles fought between the armies of Austria-Hungary and Italy in northern Italy between 1915 and 1918. Disposal specialists returned to dispose of the munitions. http://photoblog.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09/01/13612930-melting-glacier-reveals-world-war-i-ammunition Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Duiker Posted 2 September , 2012 Share Posted 2 September , 2012 Thanks for sharing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShirlD Posted 2 September , 2012 Share Posted 2 September , 2012 Thank you for this interesting story - I had 5 Italian relatives who were called up to fight, they lived in Alexandria, Egypt, served, and all returned home safely, I know nothing else. It would have been a difficult terrain to fight in, and one hopes that all this amunition can be rendered safe today! Cheers Shirley Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marco Posted 2 September , 2012 Share Posted 2 September , 2012 Melting glaciers high up can be a treasure trove. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShirlD Posted 2 September , 2012 Share Posted 2 September , 2012 Marco, What exactly are those images? Cheers Shirley Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marco Posted 2 September , 2012 Share Posted 2 September , 2012 Hello Shirley, An Austro-Hungarian belt buckle and a Fiat machinegun magazine. Do you know the story of the body found in a melting glacier? http://aur.home.xs4all.nl/layout/frames.htm?News/news2004.htm Regards, Marco Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShirlD Posted 2 September , 2012 Share Posted 2 September , 2012 Thank you Marco, I do remember reading that, and appreciate the link to read it again. Just when you think there is no more to be found, documents and photos are discovered, and then battlefield remains appear and the stark reality of war stops you in your tracks. Cheers Shirley Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seadog Posted 2 September , 2012 Share Posted 2 September , 2012 See below for the story in the Daily Mail today take a look at the second photo and the first five shells from the left. By the looks of them the driving bands have been removed from these apparently unfired shells. Just proves that the Belgian and French metal collectors got everywhere even 3200m up an Italian glacier!. Link http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2197174/First-World-War-ammunition-frozen-time-nearly-century-glacier-melts.html Norman PS Yes I have seen that they are described as "bullets". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seadog Posted 3 September , 2012 Share Posted 3 September , 2012 Has anybody got a theory as to why the driving bands were removed from the shells this far up a mountain. I believe that the current understanding is that these were chiseled off by locals for the value of the copper, certainly in France/Belgium but who is going to do it in this location I can only presume it was the soldiers who were responsible. Norman Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
depaor01 Posted 3 September , 2012 Share Posted 3 September , 2012 I'm no metallurgist, but if the decrease in temperature caused the projectile to shrink at a different rate than the driving band couldn't the bands have simply dropped off...? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seadog Posted 3 September , 2012 Share Posted 3 September , 2012 In that case they would have all dropped off not just a few and consider that the driving bands are a very tight fit plus if they have fallen off they would be found near the shells surely. I do not know the answer to this but it is accepted that such parts of the shell were removed by the locals after the war, but up a mountain on a glacier?. Mametz Wood France .. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marco Posted 3 September , 2012 Share Posted 3 September , 2012 'Up a mountain on a glacier' doesn't mean the same for locals as it does to us. Who do you think do most finds there now? Not people in an organised (Leger) tour bus... Regards, Marco Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
martin_sole Posted 3 September , 2012 Share Posted 3 September , 2012 I'm no metallurgist, but if the decrease in temperature caused the projectile to shrink at a different rate than the driving band couldn't the bands have simply dropped off...? Isn't it more likely that the copper has contracted and some of the rings have split? Copper water pipes certainly get very brittle in cold weather. Also bear in mind that after almost 100 years in a glacier these artefacts will probably be tens, if not hundreds of meters away from where they were first dropped, so the fragments of copper may be nowhere near the shell bodies. Just a guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bernard_Lewis Posted 3 September , 2012 Share Posted 3 September , 2012 A sobering image from Mametz Wood some 90+ years on. One of my favourite quotes, by a Swansea Battalion officer in 1936: 'The battalion did a great many things in the war, but the hardest thing it did was attack Mametz Wood'. Bernard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seadog Posted 4 September , 2012 Share Posted 4 September , 2012 Bernard I expect you have viewed this superb video on Mametz Words from Mametz Wood http://vimeo.com/28134870 Norman Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NigelS Posted 12 January , 2014 Share Posted 12 January , 2014 The Telegraph Magazine today (11th January & yes this is my third posting today on Telegraph Great War coverage!) has an interesting article by Laura Spinney (titled 'Frozen Waste') on Great War related material that's emerged from the melting glaciers in the Trentino region of Italy with some good some photographs. This ranges from the munitions previously described through to a wooden cabin used as a station for one of the cableway transport systems (at Punta Linke); Inevitably bodies have also been found (some 80 over the last decades). The discovery of the mummified remains of three un-armed Hapsburg soldiers (thought to be stretcher bearers) found at 12,000ft and the efforts being made to identify them is described (DNA profiling is being used, but its proving difficult to find potential relatives and contextual information about the circumstances of death is lacking); pending any success with identification the three have been interred in unmarked graves in a nearby cemetery alongside the graves of others discovered. In connection with the discussion on drive bands etc the article gives this: ...In the hungry period following the armistice, the villagers roamed the mountains looking to salvage materials they could reuse or sell. Some pieces they kept as souvenirs, donating them to the museum [the village of Peio's War Museum] when it opened 10 years ago. 'They consider the museum their collective property,' Dalpez [the village's Mayor] says. 'they're proud of it' Unfortunately the article - at least as yet - isn't available on-line, so for anyone interested it will be necessary to get hold of a copy of the magazine. NigelS Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mandy hall Posted 12 January , 2014 Share Posted 12 January , 2014 http://www.visittrentino.it/image/From+war+to+peace.pdf?id=2b7916f2-5622-4b37-ac06-b912ab3a70c6&modified=2013040917112919 http://www.sulletraccedellagrandeguerra.it/en/index.html The above two links will help anyone interested in visiting the area. I used both when researching for last years holiday in September. We spent a week based in Temu. Loads of Great War places to visit in the area. Unfortunately we went specifically to see rock carvings, but I did manage to squeeze in one days Great War sight seeing. Mandy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NigelS Posted 14 January , 2014 Share Posted 14 January , 2014 The Telegraph Magazine article is now available online Click (there's also a link to a video interview with William Spencer, TNA Military Records Specialist, about the release of the digitized war dairies at the end) NigelS Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seaJane Posted 14 January , 2014 Share Posted 14 January , 2014 Thanks for the link to the Telegraph article, Nigel. Rather good, I thought. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anthony osborne Posted 14 January , 2014 Share Posted 14 January , 2014 Thanks for posting the links - very interesting stuff. Ant Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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