Mexico’s Navy is Battling Seaweed Along the Caribbean Coast
Mexico’s Navy is Battling Seaweed Along the Caribbean Coast
Mountains of seaweed are blanketing beaches around the Caribbean Sea and the government is calling everyone to arms
[font size=1]
In July, the Caribbean had about 12,300 square miles of sargassum floating around—enough to blanket Maryland. (Manuel Balles/NurPhoto/Corbis)
[/font]
By Danny Lewis
smithsonian.com
November 2, 2015 6:00AM
Cancun’s beaches are famous around the world for their pearly-white sand. But for months, those same beaches and many more around the Caribbean have been blanketed in tons of brown, stinky seaweed. Now, Mexico is calling in its navy to mobilize experts to figure out how to clean the beaches.
The seaweed, called “sargassum,” is a type of algae normally found in the Caribbean Sea. The namesake for the Sargasso Sea, the long brown algae is usually seen as a good thing, providing food and shelter for seals, fish, sea turtles and birds alike. But this year, the sargassum is blooming more than ever before, Joshua Partlow and Gabriela Martinez report for The Washington Post.
“It’s in the entire tropical Atlantic,” University of Florida oceanographer Chuanmin Hu tells Partlow and Martinez. “It’s amazing.”
According to Hu, back in July the Caribbean had about 12,300 square miles of sargassum floating around—enough to blanket Maryland. Just four years ago, Hu recorded only 2,300 square miles of seaweed across the entire Caribbean basin. There are several theories for what caused this year’s enormous bloom, including warming oceans, shifting currents and fertilizer runoff from Amazonian farms, but scientists are still stumped by the sheer quantity of sargassum, Partlow and Martinez report.
Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/mexicos-navy-battling-seaweed-along-caribbean-coast-180957112/#uwbJYvdwfyijQqKW.99
Environment & Energy:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/112793164
