But in this case, he wasn’t going to come back. A landmine exploded, killing him instantly as his family watched in horror. The Black Sea has been contaminated by hundreds of mines dropped by both sides in Russia’s war against Ukraine, posing a serious threat to people and the reopening of grain routes halted by Moscow’s sea blockade. “It’s really a big problem,” said Vladlen Tobak, a former Ukrainian navy diving instructor and founder of a diving school in Odessa. “These mines are there along with other unexploded devices from the second world war that we continue to find. The main concern is that we do not know how many mines were dropped during the naval blockade. It will take a long time to clear the waters from these devices.” Kyiv and Moscow accuse each other of dropping mines in the Black Sea. The extent of the mining operations remains unknown, but Sergei Brachuk, a spokesman for the Odesa regional military command, says between 400 and 600 mines were dropped in Ukraine’s maritime zone by Russia. In March, Russia’s defense ministry and state security agency, the FSB, warned of “floating Ukrainian mines off the coast of Odesa”, which were said to have washed up after a storm. According to Moscow, the Russian military has mapped about 370 Ukrainian sea mines. People swim in the sea off Odessa, where the Ukrainian government has banned coastal swimming. Photo: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian Sea mines, designed to detonate when a vessel’s hull comes into contact with them, are anchored to a steel cable to hold them underwater. However, they can become loose in storms and drift long distances in ocean currents. Sea mines are not banned by international agreements, unlike land mines. However, international humanitarian law sets certain rules. For example, states can deploy them in their territorial waters to defend their coasts from external attacks. The Hague Convention prohibits the use of drift mines in international waters. In June, Ukraine publicly admitted that it “laid sea mines in the exercise of our right to self-defense, as defined in Article 51 of the UN Charter.” The government banned coastal swimming at the same time. But with temperatures reaching 35 degrees Celsius, many people are ignoring the restrictions and flocking to the beach. Roman Kostenko, a member of the Ukrainian parliament and commander of Ukrainian special forces, confirmed to the Guardian: “We have mined the coast and some areas closer to the coast to prevent a Russian invasion from the water. However, we do not know exactly the extent and placement of the Russian mines.” The presence of sea mines is also a serious threat to other countries bordering the Black Sea. Bulgarian officials have warned citizens living near the coast to watch out for mines, while Romania is working to neutralize devices found in its waters, according to reports. As for Turkey, at least two mines appear to have washed ashore, prompting Ankara to discuss the matter with Moscow and Kyiv. On Friday, an anti-ship mine washed ashore in the Odesa region, the press service of the Ukrainian navy reported. “Defense forces have detected another floating anti-mine in the Black Sea near the coast in the Odesa region. The dangerous discovery was quickly neutralized by a naval unit of the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” he said on Facebook. Ukrainian MP Roman Kostenko said there is only the outline of a plan to demining the Black Sea. Photo: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian At least two Ukrainians have died in landmine explosions in recent weeks. “It’s not about the shock wave itself,” said Oleg Solokha, a former Ukrainian military diver. “When a mine explodes, even if you’re not very close to it, you can lose consciousness or get dizzy. You lose your spatial orientation and your mind does not understand where is up and where is down. It is very dangerous. You can easily drown because of it.” It is not yet clear what type of mines are floating in the Black Sea. A Ukrainian foreign ministry official told Reuters in March that 372 sea mines laid by Russia were of the “R-421-75” type, which were neither registered nor used by Ukraine’s navy. “There are different types of sea mines,” Solokha said. “There are contact mines and magnets, as well as modifications of these with vibration sensors. 99% of the time we just detonate the mines because the older trinitrotoluene in a mine becomes unstable over time and can detonate on its own. Another reason they are detonated is that the triggers (the spikes on the mine) are impossible to disengage if the mine remains in the water for too long.” With changing tides and storms, the failure of anchored devices complicates mine clearance efforts. Experts agree that demining the Black Sea could take years, and any attempt to do so would be the most extensive since the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s. Speaking on condition of anonymity, a Ukrainian official said authorities were planning a demining sweep using robots, but that it would be months before it was operational. Kostenko confirmed the existence of a demining plan, but said for now it was only an outline.
