Fisheries nations to decide fate of declining bigeye tuna – “The stock is in the red with a very high level of certainty”

By Marlowe Hood 28 September 2018 (AFP) – Dozens of nations with commercial fisheries in the Atlantic Ocean will grapple next week with a new finding that bigeye tuna, the backbone of a billion dollar business, is severely depleted and overfished. Unless catch levels are sharply reduced, scientists warned, stocks of the fatty, fast-swimming predator […]

Half of killer whales doomed to die from pollution – “It is like a killer whale apocalypse”

By Damian Carrington 27 September 2018 (The Guardian) – At least half of the world’s killer whale populations are doomed to extinction due to toxic and persistent pollution of the oceans, according to a major new study. Although the poisonous chemicals, PCBs, have been banned for decades, they are still leaking into the seas. They […]

Governments urged to “do the hard work” to better manage global migration – “Unregulated, unmanaged migration has created false and negative perceptions of migrants that feed into a narrative of xenophobia, intolerance, and racism”

26 September 2018 (UN News) – As world leaders met at the United Nations on Wednesday to discuss the first global agreement designed to better manage international migration, a leading voice on migrants’ rights urged them to “do the hard work” of turning words into action.The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, set […]

The high cost of preserving vulnerable beaches – “This is literally a never-ending commitment”

By Lisa Song and Al Shaw 27 September 2018 (ProPublica) – As lawmakers consider disaster relief in the wake of Hurricane Florence, projects to rebuild North Carolina’s shrunken shorelines are likely to get a healthy chunk of government money. To their advocates, these so-called beach nourishment initiatives are crucial steps in buffering valuable oceanfront properties […]

Across the Arctic, lakes are leaking dangerous greenhouse gases – “These lakes speed up permafrost thaw. It’s an acceleration.”

By Chris Mooney 25 September 2018 (The Washington Post) – “The lake, about 20 football fields in size, looked as if it was boiling. Its waters hissed, bubbled and popped as a powerful greenhouse gas escaped from the lake bed. Some bubbles grew as big as grapefruits, visibly lifting the water’s surface several inches and […]

Spike in whale deaths off New England coast in September 2018 – “We’re definitely seeing more whale mortalities than we have in the past and it’s definitely concerning”

By Andres Picon 17 September 2018 (The Boston Globe) – At least four whales, including one that washed up in New Hampshire on Monday, have been reported dead around the Northeast since 9 September 2018, adding to the unusual mortality event that researchers say is affecting several whale species. “We’re definitely seeing more whale mortalities […]

Hurricane Florence dropped 8 trillion gallons of rain on North Carolina

18 September 2018 (NWS Raleigh) – Here’s the unofficial, radar-estimated storm total rainfall from Hurricane Florence over all North Carolina (actual gauge-measured amounts not included). Using the average rainfall over the state, Florence dropped about 8.04 trillion gallons of rain on NC.Note: these radar estimates are off by roughly a factor of 2 (too low) […]

Erosion of a culture – “Once we have cut down all the big trees, part of our punishment will be to live in a world without any big trees”

By Rheta Grimsley Johnson 22 August 2018 (The Bitter Southerner) – I am leaving my skiff at a funky little marina on the swamp’s west side, an access point to the Atchafalaya in the deep Cajun parish called St. Martin. Boat docked, I head to my pickup. […]It is the largest swamp and wetlands area […]

Could billionaires end society’s biggest challenges?

24 August 2018 (Self Lender) – Citizens around the globe are facing a myriad of complex challenges that feel almost impossible to solve. Problems like rising real estate costs, the extraordinarily high cost of healthcare, and rapidly increasing credit card debt feel inescapable due to both the critical thinking and the collective capital needed to […]

Walking on Venezuela’s last glacier – “It’s a little bit like losing a species: once it’s gone, you never realize that it is missing”

By Kathryn Hansen 27 September 2018 (NASA) – The retreat of Humboldt Glacier—Venezuela’s last patch of perennial ice—means that the country could soon be glacier-free. We featured the glacier in August 2018 as an Image of the Day showing how it changed between 1988 and 2015.Satellite images can tell you a lot about a glacier, […]

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