As the Danube River dries up, World War II shipwrecks and mammoth bones come into view

Key Points:

• Record-low water levels on the Danube River due to drought have exposed dozens of World War II German battleship wrecks near the Serbian port of Prahovo, remnants of Nazi Germany's Black Sea fleet scuttled in 1944 to slow the Soviet advance.
• The low water levels have severely disrupted ship traffic and pushed power plants in Central and Eastern Europe to the brink of shutdowns, prompting governments to implement electricity conservation measures amid a summer heat crisis linked to global warming.
• Efforts to remove the sunken Nazi ships have been hindered by the explosives they still carry, and while some were cleared by Communist Yugoslav authorities, most remain submerged until now, with visibility increasing during recent droughts.
• In Bulgaria, the drought has also revealed well-preserved bones of a woolly mammoth near the city of Ruse, including a jawbone, tusks, and other fragments believed to belong to a single young animal from the Ice Age.
• The mammoth discovery is significant due to the concentration of bones in one location, offering valuable insights into the species that coexisted with early humans before going extinct around 4,000 years ago.