Oil slick spreads from sunken ship off Mumbai
Indian authorities worked to clean up an oil spill from a cargo ship that sank off Mumbai last week, with oil found on beaches and in water near the city’s shoreline.
What was natural in the coastal oceans?
Humans transformed Western Atlantic coastal marine ecosystems before modern ecological investigations began. The universal pattern of losses demonstrates that no coastal ecosystem is pristine and few wild fisheries are sustainable along the entire Western Atlantic coast.
Wild Boar Deaths linked to Green Algae: Confirmed
First tests on wild boars washed up on Brittany’s beaches, showed that all but one, had hydrogen sulphide gas (emitted by rotting green algae) in their lungs. Test results on the remaining boars haven’t been released yet.
US opens ways for Shell drilling in Arctic Ocean
The US Interior Department has opened the doors to Shell’s proposal for four shallow water exploration wells in Alaska’s Beaufort Sea to start in July 2012.
Green Algae Chokes Eastern China’s Beaches
In Qingdoo, Shandong Eastern Province of China, the coastal waters are covered with algae called enteromorpha prolifera. Though this green algae is not poisonous per se, it consumes large amounts of oxygen that can threaten marine life.
Oil pollution in Niger Delta: Environmental Assessment of Ogoniland Report; Unep
A report by the UN Environment Programme, which carried out a 14-month assessment of pollution from over 50 years of oil operations in Ogoniland – Niger Delta region, has found widespread and devastating oil pollution that may require the world’s biggest ever clean-up, that could take 20-30 years. The UNEP also called for the oil industry and the Nigerian government to contribute $1 billion to a clean-up fund for the region to properly address this “tragic legacy.”
Ban turtle eggs trade in Malaysia: WWF
Sea turtles once arrived in their thousands to lay eggs on Malaysian beaches, but are now increasingly rare due to poaching and coastal development.
Ice-shelf collapse from subsurface warming as a trigger for Heinrich events.
An analysis of prehistoric “Heinrich events”creating mass discharges of icebergs into the North Atlantic Ocean, make it clear that very small amounts of subsurface warming of water can trigger a rapid collapse of ice shelves, scientists say.
Ancient Tides Quite Different From Today
Geological forces that act over hundreds to millions of years, such as plate tectonics, ice ages, land uplift, erosion and sedimentation, have caused the tides, generally thought to be one of the most predictable forces on Earth, to vary wildly throughout history, according to a new study.