The Urgent Islands

The New York Times, August 29, 2010
Editorial

If a country sinks beneath the sea, is it still a country? That is a question about which the Republic of the Marshall Islands — a Micronesian nation of 29 low-lying coral atolls — is now seeking expert legal advice. It is also a question the United States Senate might ask itself the next time it refuses to deal with climate change.

According to the world’s leading scientists, sea-level rise is one of the greatest dangers of global warming, threatening not only islands but coastal cities like New Orleans and even entire countries like Bangladesh.

In 2007, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change conservatively predicted a 20-inch sea-level rise by the end of this century if current trends were not reversed. Because of various uncertainties, its calculations excluded the melting of the Greenland and West Antarctica ice sheets. Some academic studies have suggested that rises of four to seven feet are not out of the question.

Officials in the Marshall Islands — where a 20-inch rise would drown at least one atoll — are not only thinking about the possibility of having to move entire populations but are entertaining even more existential questions: If its people have to abandon the islands, what citizenship can they claim? Will the country still have a seat at the United Nations? Who owns its fishing rights and offshore mineral resources?

Marshall Islands leaders have asked Michael Gerrard, an expert on climate change law at Columbia University, to help them find answers to what he regards as plausible questions. He further notes that an island can become uninhabitable before the sea level rises above it, because even moderate storms can swamp any agricultural land and render freshwater supplies undrinkable.

All of this reminds us of an astonishing remark last month by Senator Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri. When asked why she saw no immediate need to pass a comprehensive energy and climate bill, she said, “You know, it took 50 years on health care.” If only the earth could wait that long.

Training Same as Always, Navy is Insisting

The Maui News, August 29, 2010
By Chris Hamilton

KAHULUI - U.S. Navy training exercises in waters around Hawaii and across the Pacific would be the same kinds of activities that have been under way for decades, including sonar training and the use of explosives under water, Navy officials said last week.

The U.S. Navy brought its application to renew an environmental impact statement allowing its ships, submarines and planes to continue training in waters around Hawaii and Southern California to a lightly attended open house in Kahului on Friday.

Opponents have objected to the Navy's use of sonar in its exercises within the 1.2 million-square-mile Hawaii testing range, saying the powerful sounds cause injuries to marine mammals including humpback whales.

"We believe our effects (with sonar) are temporary," said Fleet Environmental Counsel Johnny Nilsen. "We do not believe that the sonar is going to kill any mammals."

The Navy must, by law, conduct training exercises to be prepared for the event of attack or war, and that involves using explosive devices in the water as well, Nilsen added. However, their main concern is trying to detect diesel-powered submarines, which are becoming increasingly popular among some Asian countries, such as North Korea, he said.

None of the training and tests under consideration is for land targets, Navy officials said.

"This is more of the same," said Mark Matsunaga, environmental public affairs officer for the U.S. Pacific Fleet command of the EIS process. "We have been doing these activities for decades."

At least a dozen residents stopped by for the four-hour-long open house at Maui Waena Intermediate School. Another dozen Navy officers, spokespeople, private consultants and scientists were on hand to answer the public's questions.

A number of those who visited the event were skeptical of the Navy's claims.

"Of course, you darn well know they are just telling you what you want to hear," said Mele Stokesberry of Maui Peace Action. "They've got to defend their positions."

Stokesberry said she was concerned that the Navy is using depleted uranium in its weapons training but was told that only the Army uses the controversial metal for its projectiles.

Mahealani Oliver said she came to find out firsthand where the Navy got the authority to conduct its operations in both the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary and the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument. She also said she was concerned about its impact on the environment and aquatic life.

"I just don't think it's a good place for training, you know?" Oliver said.

Keep Reading:

Kindai bluefin tuna, farmed sustainably, available in Philadelphia

(Photo Credit: Laurence Kesterson)

Joseph Lasprogota, director of purchasing at Samuels & Son Seafood
in South Philly, moves a 196-pound Kindai bluefin tuna.

By Aliza Green
The Philadelphia Inquirer

It's a chilly 35 degrees in the fish-cutting room at the new state-of-the-art headquarters of Samuels & Son Seafood in South Philadelphia's wholesale fish market.

Two workers carefully lift the beautiful, shiny, silvery-blue, torpedo-shaped, 196-pound tuna from its coffin-shaped foam air-freight container onto the worktable.

This ultra-luxury bluefin tuna called Kindai is flown in weekly from Japan for Samuels to sell to chefs who pay about $40 to $50 per pound to serve it, usually as sushi, ceviche, or crudo.

One of the company's top cutters, Pham Mung, carefully dissects the fish into custom-cut sections, with the super-fatty bottom loin, or otoro, the most expensive. The silky, buttery, luminous flesh is deep red, almost purple, with a beautiful texture and a pure and vivid taste.

But this bluefin tuna was not caught in the open sea; it began its life as an egg in a lab at a Japanese university and is now being offered at some of the finest local restaurants serving sushi and crudo, including Morimoto, Zama, and Vetri in Center City and Fuji in Haddonfield.

Since the 1970s, as sushi has grown into a worldwide phenomenon, demand has skyrocketed for bluefin, a fish many sushi aficionados consider piscine royalty. As a result, "an estimated 80 percent of the world's bluefin tuna stocks have been fished out."

Read more:

Arctic Ice: Less than Meets the Eye

NewScientist, August 25, 2010
By Chris Mooney

The ice may not retreat as much as feared this year, but what remains may be more rotten than robust

LAST September, David Barber was on board the Canadian icebreaker CCGS Amundsen (pictured below), heading into the Beaufort Sea, north of Alaska. He was part of a team investigating ice conditions in autumn, the time when Arctic sea ice shrinks to its smallest extent before starting to grow again as winter sets in.

Barber, an environmental scientist at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Canada, went to sleep one night at midnight, just before the ship was due to reach a region of very thick sea ice. The Amundsen is only capable of breaking solid ice about a metre thick, so according to the ice forecasts for ships, the region should have been impassable.

Yet when Barber woke up early the next morning, the ship was still cruising along almost as fast as usual. Either someone had made a mistake and the ship was headed for catastrophe, or there was something very wrong with the ice, he thought, as he rushed to the bridge in his pyjamas.

On the surface, the situation in the Arctic looks dramatic enough. In September 2007, the total extent of sea with surface ice shrank further than ever recorded before - to nearly 40 per cent below the long-term average. This low has yet to be surpassed. But the extent of sea ice is not all that matters, as Barber found. Look deeper and there are even more dramatic changes. This is something everyone should be concerned about because the transformation of the Arctic will affect us all.

The record low in 2007 cannot be blamed on global warming alone; weather played a big role too. That year saw a build-up of high pressure over the Beaufort Sea and a trough of low pressure over northern Siberia - a weather pattern called the Arctic dipole anomaly. It brings warm, southerly winds that increase melting. The winds also drive sea ice away from the Siberian coast and out of the Arctic Ocean towards the Atlantic, where it melts.

Keep Reading

Gulf spill to blame for oily blobs in vital Gulf sea life?

Orange droplets that have tested positive for hydrocarbons are visible trapped inside the shell of an immature blue crab collected near Grand Isle, La. Researchers wondering how the Gulf of Mexico will affect the Gulf oil spill are paying close attention to the blue crab.

(Photo Credit: USM Gulf Coast Research Laboratory/AP)

Christian Science Monitor, August 24, 2010
By Bill Sasser

New Orleans

To find out how the food chain has been affected by the Gulf oil spill, marine scientists are closely monitoring this year’s spawn of blue crab – a key kind of plankton – in the Gulf of Mexico.
late May, marine biologist Erin Grey, a post-doctoral researcher at Tulane University, discovered oily orange droplets inside blue crab larvae she collected in areas affected by the BP oil spill.

Eighty percent of crab larvae samples collected from an area of the Gulf stretching from Louisiana to Florida showed evidence of the orange substance, which initially tested positive for hydrocarbons, says Dr. Grey, who along with other Tulane researchers, is collaborating with the University of Southern Mississippi’s Gulf Coast Research Laboratory.

More blue crab larvae with the orange blobs were recently collected off Grand Isle in Louisiana, she adds.

“This is something that researchers with decades of experience have never seen before, and we think it must be linked to the spill,” says Grey.

Subsequent testing, however, has yet to give a definitive answer on whether the unusual substance contains either oil or dispersants related to the oil spill, she says. “It’s been frustrating because you want answers, and initial analyses said, 'Yes, it’s hydrocarbons,' but we still haven’t gotten a clear enough reading to say for sure,” she adds.

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Congratulations to our Photo Contest Winner, Karen Barcellos!

Karen Barcellos sent us several beautiful images of Humpback whales she took in the Hawaiian Islands Humpack Whale National Marine Sanctuary in Maui, and this is the one we liked best. Her winning photo will be featured in our next newsletter and on our facebook page.

Thank you very much to everyone who submitted photographs to our photo contest, we hope to hear from you all again next time we have a photo contest!

MCBI Movie to be shown at film festival

A film about MCBI and our work to establish National Marine Monuments in the Pacific will be shown at the Blue Ocean Film Festival in Monterey, California on Saturday, August 28th at the Maritime Museum.

If you're in the area, you should come!

For more information about the festival, click here.