Stress and effect on a vessel in severe weather conditions

Stress and effect on a vessel in severe weather conditions.

Recorded during passage from Suez Canal to Singapore, recorded in June 2008.

Haven

HAVEN from Les films engloutis

Short film about the exploration on breathhold of the biggest wreck in Mediterranean sea, by 3 world champions Guillaume Néry, Morgan Bourc'His and Rémy Dubern.

All the images were shot between 40 meters and 50 meters.

Microplastics killing fish before they reach reproductive age, study finds

A pike (Esox lucius) feeds on perch that have ingested microplastic particles.

Photograph: Oona Lönnstedt/Science

From The Guardian by Fiona Harvey

Tiny particles of plastic litter in oceans causing deaths, stunted growth and altering behaviour of some fish that feed on them, research shows

Fish are being killed, and prevented from reaching maturity, by the litter of plastic particles finding their way into the world’s oceans, new research has proved.
Some young fish have been found to prefer tiny particles of plastic to their natural food sources, effectively starving them before they can reproduce.

The growing problem of microplastics – tiny particles of polymer-type materials from modern industry – has been thought for several years to be a peril for fish, but the study published on Thursday is the first to prove the damage in trials.
Microplastics are near-indestructible in natural environments.
They enter the oceans through litter, when waste such as plastic bags, packaging and other convenience materials are discarded.
Vast amounts of these end up in the sea, through inadequate waste disposal systems and sewage outfall.

Another growing source is microbeads, tiny particles of hard plastics that are used in cosmetics, for instance as an abrasive in modern skin cleaners.
These easily enter waterways as they are washed off as they are used, flushed down drains and forgotten, but can last for decades in our oceans.

The impact of these materials has been hard to measure, despite being a growing source of concern.
Small particles of plastics have been found in seabirds, fish and whales, which swallow the materials but cannot digest them, leading to a build-up in their digestive tracts.

 A perch with ingested microplastic polystyrene particles.

Photograph: Oona Lönnstedt/Science

For the first time, scientists have demonstrated that fish exposed to such materials during their development show stunted growth and increased mortality rates, as well as changed behaviour that could endanger their survival.

Samples of perch, still in their larval state, were shown not only to take in the plastics, but to prefer them to their real food.
Larval perch with access to microplastic particles ate only the plastics, ignoring their natural food source of plankton.

The study, published in Science on Thursday, found that the fish born into an environment rich in microplastics – defined as tiny pieces of less than 5mm in size – had reduced rates of hatching and development to maturity.

The perch studied also ignored the chemical signals that would normally warn them of the presence of predators, the researchers found.
These particles are now found in abundance across the world’s oceans, and are often common in shallow coastal areas, where they wash in from waste dumps and sewerage systems
“This is the first time an animal has been found to preferentially feed on plastic particles, and is cause for concern,” said Peter Eklöv, co-author of the study.
“Larvae exposed to microplastic particles during development also displayed changed behaviours and were much less active than fish that had been reared in water that contained no microplastic particles.”

Environmental campaigners have been calling for a reduction in the waste allowed to drift from rivers into seas and oceans, and for an end to the use of artificial microplastics in cosmetics.
Greenpeace launched a campaign against microbeads early this year, and several companies have committed to phasing them out.

However, the study suggests that damage has already been done, and preventing the leakage of more microplastics into the oceans should be a matter of urgency, as once they are in our seas they are almost impossible to get rid of.

Perch exposed to microplastics in the study were eaten by pike four times more quickly than their naturally-reared relatives, when the predators were introduced into their environment.
All of the plastic-exposed fish in the study were dead within 48 hours.

Microplastics visible in a pike.
Photograph: Oona Lönnstedt/Science
    

This suggests that the impacts of microplastics are likely to be far-reaching and long-lasting, beyond the immediate effects on the fish’s digestive systems, which was previously the main cause of concern.
Plastics may be causing differing behaviour in the fish, and inhibiting their evolved responses to danger, through mechanisms not yet fully understood.

The study adds to research that has found coastal fish species suffering marked declines in recent years, while the amount of plastic litter in the oceans has increased.
“If early life-history stages of other species are similarly affected by microplastics, and this translates to increased mortality rates, the effects on aquatic ecosystems could be profound,” warned Oona Lönnstedt, another of the report’s authors.

Links :

• The Telegraph : Ocean fish prefer to eat dangerous microplastics rather than plankton new study finds 
• BBC : Fish eat plastic like teens eat fast food, researchers say

Is the new Suez Canal encouraging the spread of invasive species?

The new Suez Canal channel, running parallel to the original canal from 1869 NASA Earth Observatory/Jesse Allen

From Geographical by Chris Fitch

The iconic Suez Canal now has a twin channel, likely leading to a vast increase in shipping between Port Said and Suez.

However, there are dire warnings about the impact this project has had on marine wildlife in the Mediterranean.

The construction of the Suez Canal in the 19th century was an affair marred by accusations of slave labour and geopolitical jostling between Britain and France, resulting in a decade of controversy and financial horse-trading.
Nevertheless, when the 193km canal eventually opened in 1869 it had an immediate and dramatic impact on global trade, allowing ships a vastly quicker route between Europe and Asia, even if the first journeys took upwards of 40 hours to travel the length of the canal.

New images have now emerged revealing the most recent canal expansion, which was completed in August 2015, and officially opened by the the Suez Canal Authority in February 2016.
The expansion itself has seen the widening and deepening of the existing canal, as well as the construction of a new 35km channel running parallel to the original.
Understandably, the revolution of trade infrastructure over the past century-and-a-half – principally through the take-off in aviation travel – has diminished the importance of the Suez Canal.

Nevertheless, this expansion will likely have a significant impact on daily traffic through the canal, anticipated to grow from 49 ships at present, to 97 by 2023.
Additionally, waiting times are expected to drop to three hours instead of between eight and 11 hours at present, and transit times through the canal would become 11 hours instead of 18 hours. Interestingly, unlike many canals across the world, neither the original nor the new Suez Canals contain any locks, since the water levels in the Mediterranean and the Red Sea are are similar enough that ships can sail straight through.

 NASA satellite images from April 2014 (L) and April 2016 (R) show the scale of the new Suez construction

(Image: NASA Earth Observatory / Jesse Allen)

However, prior to the opening of the new canal, there were concerns expressed by many in the scientific community about the lack of a rigorous study into the environmental impacts which the canal expansion might have, particularly in terms of the spread of invasive species.
‘It’s not a possibility, it happens,’ says Dr Elizabeth Cook, Head of the Scottish Association for Marine Science and a senior lecturer in Marine Biology.
‘It’s unbelievable how the eastern side of the Mediterranean is changing. Some of the species are now migrating, particularly the fish species, and some of them are noxious and cause fatalities. Compared to Northern Europe, there’s no comparison in the changes that are going on for invasives.’

Cook is one of several international scientists who have penned articles in recent years, warning of the dramatic impacts which the Suez expansion will have on the ecology of the marine environments of the Mediterranean.
Writing in the journal Biological Invasions last year, they reveal that, ‘of nearly 700 multicellular non-indigenous species currently recognised from the Mediterranean Sea, fully half were introduced through the Suez Canal since 1869.’
The worry is that the new channel will significantly increase this trend. In a separate article last year for the journal The Limnology and Oceanography Bulletin, they implored the Egyptian government to publish an ‘Environmental Impact Assessment’ for the Suez expansion, which they stated was, ‘one opportunity to prevent, or minimise, a potential great ecological setback to the biodiversity and the ecosystem of the Mediterranean Sea that should not be missed.’

 The number of non-indigenous species in some Mediterranean countries.

In red, the fraction of species likely introduced through the Suez Canal

(Image: Galil et al.) 

‘It’s a well-known fact for a number years that invasive species have been able to get through into the Mediterranean through the Suez Canal, and they are completely changing the ecology of the eastern part,’ emphasises Cook.
She highlights one species, the highly poisonous jellyfish Rhopilema nomadica, swarms of which have caused numerous problems across the Mediterranean since first passing through the canal in the 1980s.
‘Certain species are even starting to get to the western side,’ she warns.

Links :

• National Geographic : Panama Canal: Superhighway for Invasive Species?
• GeoGarage blog : Suez canal scheme ‘threatens ecosystem and human activity in Mediterranean’ / Egypt shows off $8billion Suez Canal expansion that the world may not need / Egypt to build new Suez canal / Suez canal transit in 30 seconds

Deep, old water explains why Antarctic Ocean hasn't warmed

Observed warming over the past 50 years (in degrees Celsius per decade) shows rapid warming in the Arctic, while the Southern Ocean around Antarctica has warmed little, if at all.

Credit: K. Armour / UW

From Phys by Hannah Hickey

The waters surrounding Antarctica may be one of the last places to experience human-driven climate change.
New research from the University of Washington and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology finds that ocean currents explain why the seawater has stayed at roughly the same temperature while most of the rest of the planet has warmed.

The study resolves a scientific conundrum, and an inconsistent pattern of warming often seized on by climate deniers. Observations and climate models show that the unique currents around Antarctica continually pull deep, centuries-old water up to the surface - seawater that last touched Earth's atmosphere before the machine age, and has never experienced fossil fuel-related climate change. The paper is published May 30 in Nature Geoscience.

"With rising carbon dioxide you would expect more warming at both poles, but we only see it at one of the poles, so something else must be going on," said lead author Kyle Armour, a UW assistant professor of oceanography and of atmospheric sciences.
"We show that it's for really simple reasons, and ocean currents are the hero here."

courtesy of NASA/GSFC

Gale-force westerly winds that constantly whip around Antarctica act to push surface water north, continually drawing up water from below.
The Southern Ocean's water comes from such great depths, and from sources that are so distant, that it will take centuries before the water reaching the surface has experienced modern global warming.

Other places in the oceans, like the west coast of the Americas and the equator, draw seawater up from a few hundred meters depth, but that doesn't have the same effect.
"The Southern Ocean is unique because it's bringing water up from several thousand meters [as much as 2 miles]," Armour said.
"It's really deep, old water that's coming up to the surface, all around the continent. You have a lot of water coming to the surface, and that water hasn't seen the atmosphere for hundreds of years."

The water surfacing off Antarctica last saw Earth's atmosphere centuries ago in the North Atlantic, then sank and followed circuitous paths through the world's oceans before resurfacing off Antarctica, hundreds or even a thousand years later.

Delayed warming of the Antarctic Ocean is commonly seen in global climate models.
But the culprit had been wrongly identified as churning, frigid seas mixing extra heat downward.
The study used data from Argo observational floats and other instruments to trace the path of the missing heat.
"The old idea was that heat taken up at the surface would just mix downward, and that's the reason for the slow warming," Armour said.
"But the observations show that heat is actually being carried away from Antarctica, northward along the surface."

In the Atlantic, the northward flow of the ocean's surface continues all the way to the Arctic.
The study used dyes in model simulations to show that seawater that has experienced the most climate change tends to clump up around the North Pole.
This is another reason why the Arctic's ocean and sea ice are bearing the brunt of global warming, while Antarctica is largely oblivious.
"The oceans are acting to enhance warming in the Arctic while damping warming around Antarctica," Armour said.
"You can't directly compare warming at the poles, because it's occurring on top of very different ocean circulations."

Knowing where the extra heat trapped by greenhouse gases goes, and identifying why the poles are warming at different rates, will help to better predict temperatures in the future.
"When we hear the term 'global warming,' we think of warming everywhere at the same rate," Armour said.
"We are moving away from this idea of global warming and more toward the idea of regional patterns of warming, which are strongly shaped by ocean currents."

Links :

• GeoGarage blog : A tale of two Poles : Arctic sea ice shrinks, Antarctic grows / NASA: Antarctic sea ice grows – but the climate’s still changing
• InsideClimateNews : Why Is Antarctica's Sea Ice Growing While the Arctic Melts? Scientists Have an Answer