Researchers made 161 sightings of whales – some of them endangered – south of Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket
An unexpected number of whales is visiting the waters off New England, including an unusually high number of an endangered species, said scientists who study the animals.
A research flight made 161 sightings of seven different species of whale on 25 May south of Martha’s Vineyard and south-east of Nantucket, officials with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) said on Thursday. The sightings included 93 of sei whales, one of the highest concentrations of the rare whale during a single flight, the agency said.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
06/13/2024 - 12:13
06/13/2024 - 12:01
Makah people, whose right to hunt whales is noted in treaty, granted waiver by US government to kill two or three a year
The United States granted the Makah Native American Tribe in Washington state a long-sought waiver on Thursday that helps clear the way for its first sanctioned whale hunts since 1999.
The Makah, a tribe of 1,500 people on the north-western tip of the Olympic Peninsula, is the only Native American tribe with a treaty that specifically mentions a right to hunt whales. But it has faced more than two decades of court challenges, bureaucratic hearings and scientific review as it seeks to resume hunting for gray whales.
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06/13/2024 - 10:00
Minister should have assessed climate damage that would be caused by two large developments, advocates say
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Conservationists will ask the high court to examine whether the environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, should have assessed the climate damage that would be caused by two large coalmine developments.
The Environment Council of Central Queensland has sought special leave in Australia’s highest court to appeal against the federal court’s dismissal of what is known as the Living Wonders case.
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06/13/2024 - 10:00
Conservationists urge Plibersek to call in Daly River pastoral clearing application for assessment under commonwealth nature laws
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A farming operation in the Northern Territory has proposed clearing almost 6,000 hectares (14,800 acres) of woodlands in a stronghold for the threatened ghost bat, Australia’s largest predatory bat.
The territory’s peak conservation organisation, the Environment Centre NT, and a scientific expert on the species have called on the environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, to use her powers to call in the project in the Daly River region for assessment under commonwealth nature laws.
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06/13/2024 - 07:00
Farmed kelp could produce plastic substitutes, beauty products and food supplements. Just steer clear of seaweed chocolate
Photographs by Christian Sinibaldi, words by Joanna Moorhead
Think sun, sea, Skye – and seaweed. It’s early summer off the west coast of Scotland, and Alex Glasgow is landing a long string of orangey-black seaweed on to the barge of his water farm. It emerges on what looks like a washing line heavy with dirty rags, hoicked up from the depths. And yet, this slippery, shiny, salty substance might, just might, be going to save the planet.
When it comes to sustainability, seaweed is about as shipshape as it gets. Minimal damage to the environment, check. No use of pesticides, check. Diversifies ocean life, check. Uses no land, check. And, in the case of Skye’s seaweed farm, spoils no one’s view, check.
Kyla Orr and Martin Welch of KelpCrofters check the crop from their boat
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06/13/2024 - 05:00
Pennsylvania families worry about rising cases of rare cancer with well pads near homes and stalled House bills
One evening in 2019, Janice Blanock was scrolling through Facebook when she heard a stranger mention her son in a video on her feed. Luke, an outgoing high school athlete, had died three years earlier at age 19 from Ewing’s sarcoma, a rare bone cancer.
Blanock had come across a live stream of a community meeting to discuss rare cancers that were occurring with alarming frequency in south-western Pennsylvania, where she lives.
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06/13/2024 - 05:00
Porto Alegre’s poorest neighborhoods, often closest to rivers and with the worst infrastructure, bore brunt of crisis
It had been raining for nearly a week when the floodwaters first reached Marcelo Moreira Ferreira’s home in Porto Alegre, the capital of Brazil’s southernmost state, Rio Grande do Sul.
His wife and their four children left to seek shelter with relatives, but Ferreira, 51, wanted to stay: his father had built the modest one-story structure and he had lived there his entire life.
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06/13/2024 - 02:00
Diving with marine life such as blue sharks is growing in popularity in the UK, spurred by footage of encounters on social media
We have only been waiting in the grey Atlantic swell a few moments when the first flash of metallic blue appears in the water. A blue shark, a few miles from the coast of Penzance in Cornwall, emerges from the depths. It is time to get in the water – but part of my brain rebels.
“It’s not what you think it will be like … not that ingrained fear that everyone has about sharks. But until you get in the water with them, that fear will remain,” the guide says to the group.
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06/13/2024 - 00:04
Members of the public and wildlife organisations spot a whale entangled in two buoys and a rope off the coast of NSW. A rescue team locates the humpback in the water off Fingal Heads with help from a helicopter, before successfully removing the rope that is lodged in its fin
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06/12/2024 - 23:00
Most comprehensive analysis ever of conflict-driven climate impacts shows emissions greater than those generated by 175 countries in a year
The climate cost of the first two years of Russia’s war on Ukraine was greater than the annual greenhouse gas emissions generated individually by 175 countries, exacerbating the global climate emergency in addition to the mounting death toll and widespread destruction, research reveals.
Russia’s invasion has generated at least 175m tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2e), amid a surge in emissions from direct warfare, landscape fires, rerouted flights, forced migration and leaks caused by military attacks on fossil fuel infrastructure – as well as the future carbon cost of reconstruction, according to the most comprehensive analysis ever of conflict-driven climate impacts.
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