One appeared off the west coast of Australia in 2011 when a streak of warm water, some 100 miles wide and 3,000 miles long, surged south. Shifts beneath the surface can trigger heat waves, too. When the wind weakens, the sea temperature tends to rise because warm surface water doesn’t evaporate as easily, and colder water doesn’t get churned up from the deep. Marine heat waves can form in a number of ways, but in general they’re caused by changes in how the air and ocean currents move.
“Fish species in particular are great canaries in our collective coal mine.” “That’s the highest water temperature I’ve ever heard of in the ocean,” said Steve Murawski, a fisheries biologist at the University of South Florida who has studied oceans for 50 years.
Scientists predict more fisheries will collapse in coming years as climate change - and the ongoing El Niño weather pattern warming the Pacific - spurs more marine heat waves As a result, six of the last seven Dungeness crab seasons in California have been delayed. The northeastern Pacific Ocean has experienced several hot spells over the past decade - including the Blob 2.0 - and it’s still experiencing one. The economic toll from a single occurrence on fisheries and coastal economies can be as hefty as $3.1 billion. Fish farms in Chile, scallop operations in Australia, and snow crab pots in Alaska have already fallen victim to oceanic overheating. The Blob was the largest and longest-lasting marine heat wave on record. It might also have been an early glimpse of what’s to come.
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“It occurred in this place where we have some of the best-managed fisheries in the world, and it still created all these impacts,” Free said. To support our nonprofit environmental journalism, please consider disabling your ad-blocker to allow ads on Grist. The acute warming also triggered a toxic algal bloom that disrupted the West Coast’s lucrative Dungeness crab business. In British Columbia and the Pacific Northwest, salmon runs – and the fishing industry that depends on them – floundered. Some 100 million Pacific cod, commonly used in fish and chips, vanished in the Gulf of Alaska during the Blob. It’s not just gulls and sea snails that suffer. Yet marine heat waves can “inject a lot of chaos,” said Chris Free, a fisheries scientist at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Just a deep-red splotch on a scientist’s map telling everyone it’s hot out there, and perhaps a photo of birds washed up on a faraway beach to prove it. There’s no melting asphalt, no straining electrical grids, no sweating through shirts. What happens on the 70 percent of the planet covered by saltwater is mostly out of sight. A heat wave in the ocean is not like one on land. Over the course of two years, 1 million seabirds died, kelp forests withered, and sea lion pups got stranded.īut you could have easily missed it.
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The sprawling patch of unusually tepid water in the Gulf of Alaska grew, and grew some more, until it covered an area about the size of the continental United States. Scientists first spotted the Blob in late 2013.
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More coverage: Find more photos and events at Visit Candid Candace’s website at or follow her on Twitter CandidCandace.This story is part of Record High, a Grist series examining extreme heat and its impact on how - and where - we live. Rescued animals are housed in both foster homes and at OTAT's Bucktown adoption center location.įreelance writer Candace Jordan is involved in many local organizations, including some whose events she covers. The funds will also help support adopters and grow community outreach, including humane education and assistance for disadvantaged and low-income families. The event raised over $166,000, which will fund the rescue, rehabilitation and adoption of dogs and kittens in need. A lot of dog rescues are doing similar things, but we have such great success because we do so much community outreach." She added, "We have a great adoption rate because we are very good at getting out in the community and having people meet the dogs and fall in love with them on the spot.
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