BOMBTURBATION: A New Scientific Term Inspired by Verdun

Verdun Battlefield Today

In a 2006 article published in Soil Science journal, scientists Joseph Hupy and Randall Schaetzel, who had spent long periods studying the Verdun battlefield, introduced the term ‘‘bombturbation’’ for cratering of the soil surface and mixing of the soil by explosive munitions, usually during warfare or related activities. Depending on exactly where the explosion occurs (above, on, or below the soil surface), bombturbation excavates a volume of soil from the site of impact, forming a crater and spreading much of the ejecta out as a surrounding rim of mixed, but sometimes slightly sorted, debris. Because such explosions are nonselective, that is, all of the material removed is mixed and redistributed, bombturbation is often proisotropic [tending toward randomness] and. . . causes existing soil horizons to be entirely destroyed or intimately mixed. Unlike the rare instances of extraterrestrial (meteoroid) impacts [impacturbation], bombturbation by bombs and munitions is common worldwide; on some battlefields, it is so prominent that little or none of the original soil surface remains undisturbed.

Bombturbation

In WWI, the most influential form of bombturbation came from artillery  propelled, explosive munitions, launched from various calibers, ranging from small 70mm shells that produced shallow craters (G1-m diameter) to massive 420mm rounds that left behind craters greater than 10 m in diameter and often several meters deep. The explosive shells used in WWI were particularly suited to bombturbative disturbance because they were set to detonate upon impact with whatever surface they struck. This type of detonation device directs a large amount of the blast downward into the soil  In WWII, when the forests of Europe, particularly France, were subjected to yet another round of war, the soils were not as heavily bombturbated because of advanced detonator devices in the artillery rounds with timers and proximity fuses that caused them to explode above the soil surface—in the tree canopy.

Mine Craters Éparges Spur

Another form of bombturbation in WWI that left its mark upon the landscape stemmed from the wide use of tunneling beneath enemy lines and the emplacement of explosives below ground—to be detonated beneath enemy positions. These underground mines produced massive crater complexes with craters of more than 50 m in diameter and often more than 20 m deep. In some instances, the mines, when used in combination with artillery, caused entire ridges to be lowered in elevation by several meters. For example, because of the combined effects of bombturbation, Hill 304 on the Verdun battlefield was so disturbed that its elevation dropped from 434 m before WWI in 1915 to 430 m in 1918).

Source: INTRODUCING ‘‘BOMBTURBATION,’’ A SINGULAR TYPE OF SOIL  DISTURBANCE AND MIXING," Joseph P. Hupy  and Randall J. Schaetzl, Soil Science, 2006