Pollution

LATEST TODAY'S CATCH

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

May 6, 2013 - 8:10AMThe “garbage patches,” as referred to in the media, are areas of marine debris concentration in the North Pacific Ocean, circulated by the North Pacific gyre. The gyre spreads across the Pacific Ocean from Japan to the western US...
Apr 26, 2013 - 9:47AM
At Carrie Bow Cay in Belize, Dr. Candy Feller explains her research on the...
Oct 9, 2012 - 9:17AM
In the aftermath of the Gulf oil spill, what is the effect of oil on...

SPOTLIGHT

Ocean Trash Plaguing Our Sea

In the Pacific Ocean, four ocean currents merge to form the North Pacific gyre, also known as the North Pacific Subtropical...
Jul 27 2011 - 3:28pm
We drove down a long dirt road on the northern side of Curaçao looking for a remote place to snorkel and sample. After a 30-minute bumpy ride, our team stepped out of the car into a breeze and the sounds of wind and crashing waves. It’s a moment I will never forget; although no one was in sight for...
Apr 20 2012 - 2:44pm
Two years ago last week, on April 20, 2010, an explosion on the oil-drilling rig Deepwater Horizon caused the largest marine oil spill in history, gushing nearly 5 million barrels of crude oil over the course of three months.
Dec 19 2011 - 3:07pm
A tiny yellow goby, Lubricogobius exiguus, living inside an abandoned can on the seafloor; Suruga Bay, Japan
Jun 3 2010 - 1:21pm
Oil burns during a controlled fire on May 6, 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico. The U.S. Coast Guard oversaw oil burns after the sinking, and subsequent massive oil leak, from the Deepwater Horizon oil platform off the coast of Louisiana. Learn more about the spill's environmental impact in our Gulf Oil...
May 8 2013 - 11:20am
What happens to the waste coming out of a fish processing plant? Typically the fish guts and bones get sent to sea via a pipeline, and the Environmental Protection Agency regulates how much can be dumped. The sites can attract predators, such as these seagulls, fish, and even small sharks in Alaska...
May 10 2010 - 6:10pm
Sometimes, a tragic event can become a powerful teaching opportunity. The Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has the potential to capture students’ attention and stimulate discussion on topics like: • biology and ecology (How will the oil effect wildlife and the environment?), •...
Jul 27 2011 - 4:13pm
A still from a video documenting a remote beach in Curaçao that's been blanketed in plastic garbage. You can read how this marine debris impacted on researcher on our blog. 
Sep 14 2012 - 12:33pm
For centuries, the Baltic Sea has provided European flounder (Platichthys flesus) and other fish for millions of people. Since the early 1980s, the nations surrounding the sea have coordinated their efforts to protect its health through the Helsinki Commission.
Science in a Time of Crisis  How Much Oil
May 10 2011 - 2:18pm
Part 2 of a 6-part series describing Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution's (WHOI) efforts to understand the scope and impact of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. "How Much Oil?" describes efforts by WHOI scientists to provide the most accurate estimates of the amount of oil...
Apr 20 2012 - 1:38pm
Mark Dodd, a wildlife biologist from Georgia's Department of Natural Resources, surveying oiled sargassum seaweed in the Gulf of Mexico after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010. Learn more about how the ecosystem is faring after the spill in this slideshow and blog post.
May 10 2013 - 2:47pm
Laysan albatrosses (Phoebastria immutabilis) are incredible birds. They have a wingspan of more than 6 feet, soaring vast distances without flapping their wings.
Oil   s Impact on Marine Invertebrates
Oct 9 2012 - 9:17am
In the aftermath of the Gulf oil spill, what is the effect of oil on invertebrates like jellyfish, clams, crabs, sea stars, and plankton? The scope of the damage is more easily observed among birds and large animals, but Dr. Chris Mah, an invertebrate zoologist at Smithsonian's National Museum...
May 4 2010 - 1:52pm
Dr. Chris Reddy, an environmental chemist from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution studies the long-term impacts of oil spills. Watch as he digs beneath the surface in Massachusetts’ Wild Harbor salt marsh to find oil that continues to impact the wetland's ecology and wildlife 40 years after a...
Dr  Nancy Rabalais  Troubled Waters in the Gulf of Mexico
Apr 7 2011 - 4:31pm
The Deepwater Horizon oil spill brought the world’s attention to the Gulf of Mexico and raised awareness of the region’s chronic loss of wetlands and the massive dead zone caused by excess nutrients from the Mississippi River. In this presentation, Dr. Nancy Rabalais outlines the challenges to...
Apr 20 2012 - 1:22pm
On April 20, 2010, an explosion on the oil-drilling rig Deepwater Horizon caused the largest marine oil spill in US history, gushing nearly 5 million barrels of crude oil over the course of three months. In the two years since, researchers have been hard at work studying the impacts of the spill....
Jun 4 2010 - 12:03pm
Health, Safety, and Environment (HSE) workers contracted by BP clean up oil on the beach in Port Fourchon, La. May 23, 2010. Hundreds of HSE contract workers cleaned up oil from the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil spill, which began washing up on beaches one month after the drilling unit exploded. More...