World’s Largest Sand Mass Discovered Under Seafloor
A giant mass of sand large enough to bury all of Manhattan under dunes more than 50 stories tall apparently erupted from the floor of the North Sea hundreds of thousands of years ago, the largest such body of sand ever found in the world, researchers say.
Japan Tsunami Holds Lessons for Pacific Northwest
The threat posed to coastal areas in the Pacific Northwest by massive tsunami flooding gained renewed attention after the magnitude 9.0 earthquake and consecutive devastating tsunami that rapidly inundated coastal areas in Japan on March 11, 2011. Scientists say that a similar tsunami hit the Pacific Northwest coast in 1700, and it may happen again. 90 percent of the coastal region’s residents evacuated effectively in japan, but a same situation would likely play out differently in the Pacific Northwest.
Land Lost to Sand Dredging
Cambodia has struggled with the environmental cost of sand mining from its rivers, and villagers who live along the banks of the Mekong River say that the land on which their houses are built is collapsing into the river because of the dredging.
Illegal Dredging Causes Major Problems, Vietnam
Unchecked and illegal sand dredging have been attributed to severe landslide that washed away houses into the Dong Nai River, in the South Central Coastal region of Vietnam.
Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation, IPCC
Climate change is amplifying risks from drought, floods, storms and rising seas, threatening all countries, and nations should prepare, an international panel of climate scientists warned in a report issued Wednesday. The report pointed in particular at coastal megacities.
BP Oil Spill’s Sticky Remnants Wash Up Sporadically On Gulf Beaches
As they walk the sands of Orange Beach, Alabama, two scientists have no difficulty finding traces of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, in fact, the Auburn University researchers have a harder time making sure those traces don’t stick to their feet.
North Sea Exclusion Zone
A cloud of explosive natural gas boiling out of the North Sea from a leak at Total’s abandoned Elgin platform forced wider evacuations off the Scottish coast on Tuesday as the French firm warned it may take six months to halt the flow.
Large Marine Protected Areas Work for Dolphins
Ecologists in New Zealand have shown for the first time that Marine Protected Areas, long advocated as a way of protecting threatened marine mammals, actually work.
Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup : 2011 Report
Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup has become the world’s largest volunteer effort for ocean health. Nearly nine million volunteers from 152 countries and locations have cleaned 145 million pounds of trash from the shores of lakes, streams, rivers, and the ocean on just one day each year.