Paardenmarkt

The sandbank Paardenmarkt is located in the Belgian part of the North Sea at about 1.5 km off the coast of Knokke. It is one of the many munition dumpsites in the oceans and contains dumped munitions from WWI, including both conventional and chemical weapons. Its closeness to the port of Zeebrugge and one of the world’s busiest maritime route may be a threat to coastal safety. For these reasons, the Paardenmarkt is probably the most dangerous marine site in Belgium. The site is currently under close monitoring and sampling campaigns are regularly carried out. In order to prevent an environmental disaster, there is a need to identify as precisely as possible the hazards and their associated risks. The objective of the proposed feasibility study is to identify the necessary knowledge to achieve a reliable risk analysis of the site such as the optimization of the monitoring of the burial site, the spatial dispersion and temporal evolution of toxic chemical products in the sediments.

Funding

FPS Health, Food chain safety and Environment – Nr 4500778700