No equipment protects against the effect of an explosive device — only distance does. A vehicle can create that distance without anyone having to go closer than necessary.
In Germany, explosive ordnance disposal is everyday business. The disposal service of Lower Saxony alone — one of the country’s sixteen federal states — recovered and disposed of some 232 tonnes of ordnance from both world wars in 1,349 operations during 2025, around 37 tonnes of it in the North Sea; in 74 operations the munitions had to be blown up on site.
Nationwide, a study by the Bundestag’s research service puts the quantity still in the ground at 100,000 to 300,000 tonnes, with some 5,000 items needing to be defused every year. The same study states plainly that exact and reliable figures cannot be established.
This is not a remainder that will be dealt with in a few years. It is a permanent task with a predictable volume — and with a risk that no amount of training removes. Every country that was fought over has its own version of these figures.
The term covers two areas that differ markedly in procedure and in what they demand.
Finds from both world wars, handled in Germany by the disposal services of the individual federal states. Usually plannable: construction site, survey, excavation, assessment. The surroundings are known, time pressure is limited, and access is often poor — excavation pit, soft ground, confined conditions.
Suspect objects and unclear finds are a matter for the police. How responsibility is organised is for each federal state to decide — in Schleswig-Holstein through the state criminal police office, in Lower Saxony through the state office for geoinformation and surveying. Unlike clearance work, the situation is dynamic, the surroundings are unknown and time pressure is high.
Closely related are hazmat and CBRNE incidents — the same logic of measuring, assessing and handling from a distance, with a different hazard picture.