Archaeology
The bottom of the gulf is one of the world's largest ship cemeteries. Because of the low salinity and cold waters, and no shipworms, the ships are relatively well preserved. Since the 6th century, major waterways were running through the gulf, and from the 8th to the 10th century about 3,000 tonnes of silver was transported there. Later, the gulf was actively used by Sweden and Russia for transport of goods. Every year saw dozens of lost ships. In the fall of 1743, 17 Russian warships returning from Finland sank in just 7 hours, and in the summer of 1747, 26 merchant vessels sank within 4 hours near Narva. A record was set in 1721 when during the evacuation of Russian troops from Finland, more than 100 vessels were lost within 3 months, including 64 in a single night.
By the end of 1996, about 5000 submerged objects were identified in the Russian part of the gulf, including 2500 ships, 1500 airplanes and small items such as boats, anchor, tanks, tractors, cars, cannons and even naval mines, aerial bombs, torpedoes and other ammunition. The ships belonged to Russia (25%), Germany (19%), United Kingdom (17%), Sweden (15%), Netherlands (8%) and Finland (7%). The remaining 9% are from Norway, Denmark, France, US, Italy, Estonia and Latvia. These objects present potential hazards to navigation, fishery, coastal construction, laying of submarine pipelines and cables and the environment. Mines were laid in the gulf during World War I (38,932 units), Russian Civil War and the Soviet-Finnish War of (1939–1940) with an estimated total number of 60,000; about 85,000 more mines were set during World War II, and only a fraction of all those were eliminated after the wars.
Read more about this topic: Gulf Of Finland