Those Seaweed Blobs Headed for Florida? See How Big They Are.
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Scientists say they spotted more than 13 million tons of Sargassum, a yellowish-brown seaweed, drifting in the Atlantic Ocean last month — a record for the month of March.
Here’s what the so-called belt of Sargassum, which can stretch thousands of miles from the western coast of Africa to the Gulf of Mexico, usually looks like in March:
Source: Optical Oceanography Laboratory at the University of South Florida College of Marine Science
Note: Sargassum density detected via satellite imagery analysis by researchers at the University of South Florida. The legend values range from 0% to 0.5% and greater, referring to the percent of the ocean surface covered by Sargassum.
Tangles of the goopy, leafy seaweed have already begun to wash ashore beaches in southern Florida and Mexico. In the coming months, they could start emitting a rotting stench as they decay, potentially posing health risks to beachgoers.
Floating mats of seaweed accumulate in the central Atlantic Ocean for much of the year. But during the spring and summer, patches of it are carried by ocean…
