A WWII bomber ship sank near the house I bought in Kent. Does insurance pay if it explodes?

I have just moved from London to Sheerness on the Isle of Sheppey in Kent and I want to know what my rights are if my house is damaged by WWII bombs.

There is a sunken World War II ship off the coast containing 1,400 tonnes of unexploded bombs, and local belief is that if they exploded they could cause a tidal wave causing severe damage to nearby Sheerness.

I had no idea about this before I moved and assumed it was just casual bar talk, but the more I look into it, the more serious the risk seems.

Will my insurance pay if my house is damaged by an explosion, or maybe the government will?

This is Money’s Sam Barker responds: I’m afraid you’ll receive the same financial assistance as anyone else whose property was damaged by World War II explosives: absolutely nothing.

But before I explain why, let me summarize the intriguing story of the SS Richard Montgomery and its potentially deadly cargo of high explosives, for the benefit of readers who may not have heard of it.

The Montgomery is an American cargo ship that ran aground in the Thames Estuary and sank in 1944, carrying 6,000 tons of explosives.

Most of it was recovered as the ship sank but had not completely sunk, but around 1,400 tonnes still lie within the wreckage, just 15 metres below sea level and 1.5 miles off the town of Sheerness.

The ship now rests on the seabed, with its masts above the water and its cargo of bombs still in place.

Public intrigue surrounding the ship has intensified since a government report in 1970 said Sheerness could be hit by a five-metre-high tsunami if all the Montgomery’s explosives detonated at once, causing a 3,000-metre-high water tower and widespread destruction.

The tsunami is also expected to hit other towns in Kent, as well as areas of Essex such as Southend-on-Sea and Canvey Island, and could reach as far as the Thames Barrier.

Subsequent reports have downplayed the damage this would cause, and indeed the likelihood of it happening.

The government’s policy is to leave the Montgomery intact and prevent other ships from colliding with it in case it causes an explosion.

The theory is that letting the explosives soak into water and become inert and the ship break up naturally is safer than risking a massive explosion by trying to remove it.

This hands-off attitude was undoubtedly influenced by the failed boarding of another sunken bomb-laden ship off the coast of Kent, the SS Kielce.

The Kielce sank in 1946 off the coast of Folkestone with a cargo of ammunition, but the ammunition exploded during a salvage attempt in 1967.

The resulting explosion registered 4.5 on the Richter scale and caused structural damage to many buildings in Folkestone, as well as widespread panic, but there were no casualties.

Your Rights If World War II Explosives Damage Your Home

Unfortunately, your rights if an explosion on the SS Richard Montgomery damages your new home are next to nothing.

Firstly, your home insurance will almost certainly not pay out. This is because insurers around the world do not normally cover war damage as it is a potentially too costly and unpredictable a risk.

This was proven in a recent court case.

In 2021, the University of Exeter discovered an unexploded 1,000kg World War II bomb on its premises. A controlled detonation damaged many university buildings, prompting the institution to claim the money from its insurer, Allianz.

Allianz argued that the insurance policy excluded war damage, but the university argued that the damage was not caused by the war but by the actions of a bomb disposal squad.

The case went to court and the university lost, and then lost a subsequent appeal.

It may be possible to get tailored insurance to cover the possibility of the wreck exploding and causing damage, but this would a) involve speaking to a specialist Lloyd’s of London broker and b) be so expensive that it may not be worth the effort.

Unfortunately, the option to claim money from the Government is also closed to you.

From 1941 onwards, the State compensated people for damage to their homes and businesses, through the War Damage Commission.

But this closed in October 1964. A year later the Government passed the War Damage Act 1965, which meant that the state had no liability to its citizens for “damage to or destruction of property” caused by war, to paraphrase widely.

Unusual in UK legislation is that this applies retrospectively, meaning it covers World War II despite being passed 20 years after the conflict ended.

This principle can also be demonstrated with a recent example.

In February 2024, the Ministry of Defence removed a World War II bomb found in Plymouth and took it out to sea to detonate.

However, the removal process damaged several homes and gardens, so the MOD said it was not liable to pay.

It is possible that a very serious explosion could prompt the government to pay some form of compensation, but there is no way to predict this.

The US has twice offered to remove the wreck of the Montgomery and its cargo, and the British government has refused on both occasions, so that option is likely to be off the table as well.

All of this means that any damage caused by the Montgomery explosion will have to be paid for out of his own pocket. But on the bright side, the risk of this happening is extremely low.

The ship has not exploded in 83 years and is unlikely to do so in the near future.