Thursday 4 August 2022 06:22 PM Caribbean shores choked by record amount of seaweed that's killing wildlife and ... trends now
Forget sea monsters and tidal waves. Beachgoers and fishermen alike are having their summers ruined by something far less cinematic: record amounts of foul-smelling 'sargassum' seaweed that have inundated huge swaths of Atlantic Ocean shoreline.
The amount of algae found in the tropical, central west and east Atlantic - as well as the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico - was up to 24.2 million tons in June. That's an increase from 18.8 million tons a month prior and a record high.
'If you put all this biomass side by side, the entire area is equivalent to six times of Tampa Bay,' Chuanmin Hu, a researcher from the University of South Florida who studied the phenomenon, told DailyMail.com.
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The amount of algae found in the tropical, central west and east Atlantic - as well as the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico - was up to 24.2 million tons in June. Sargasso seaweed is seen above in the North Sound Cayman Islands
'If you put all this biomass side by side, the entire area is equivalent to six times of Tampa Bay,' Chuanmin Hu, a researcher from the University of South Florida who studied the phenomenon, told DailyMail.com. Lakes Beach (above) is covered in sargassum in St. Andrew along the east coast of Barbados
The gigantic amounts of sargassum on beaches and close to the shore have put a damper on tourism and the Caribbean's vital fishing industries.
The situation has gotten so bad that in July, U.S. Virgin Islands Governor Albert Bryan Jr. declared a state of emergency.
In a statement, Bryan said 'the seaweed overrunning our beaches also brings the potential for disruption to businesses and other negative financial impacts to our economy.'
A day later, President Joe Biden
