Latest news with #Pacific Ocean
Yahoo
13 hours ago
- Science
- Yahoo
Record-breaking deep-sea snail species discovered 6km underwater
Scientists have discovered a giant snail species living at a depth of around 6km in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, marking the deepest-known habitat for any limpet. The species, found on hard volcanic rock some 500km southeast of Tokyo, grows to about 4cm long, remarkably large for a snail at such a depth. It has about 80 clearly defined white radial streaks on the shell. Researchers have named the species Bathylepeta wadatsumi after the god of sea in Japanese mythology and the One Piece manga series character 'Large Monk' Wadatsumi. 'Here, we report a giant Bathylepeta up to a shell length of 40.5mm from 5,922m deep in the northwestern Pacific and name it Bathylepeta wadatsumi,' they wrote in a study detailing the discovery published in Zoosystematics and Evolution. 'We also take this opportunity to salute Eiichiro Oda for continuing to chart the epic voyage of One Piece, which reminds us that the greatest voyages are driven by freedom, camaraderie and an insatiable thirst for discovery.' The snail grazes on sediment layers over rock, indicating it may be playing a specialised role in processing organic matter in deep-sea ecosystems. 'Members of this genus are notable not only for their very deep habitats but also for their large size considering the depth, with B laevis reaching 30 mm in shell length,' the study said. 'The body size of Bathylepeta is remarkable for the depth and this genus could play an important role in utilising sedimentary carbon deposited on abyssal hard substrata.' The discovery underlines the usefulness of submersible vehicles in accessing deep habitats, allowing for direct observation and collection of previously overlooked organisms. Researchers used crewed submersible DSV Shinkai 6500 to make the discovery, marking the first time a member of this genus had been observed and photographed live in its natural habitat rather than after being dredged up using a net. 'Even in an age of sophisticated remotely operated vehicles, there's often an edge to the human eye on the seafloor,' said Chong Chen, lead author of the study. 'Crewed submersibles like Shinkai 6500 let us explore with intention and nuance – spotting lifeforms like Bathylepeta wadatsumi that might otherwise be missed entirely.' Scientists hope future studies using submersibles will reveal the true diversity and distribution of such snails and other animals living in deep-sea ecosystems. 'Our finding underscores the need for more comprehensive explorations of rocky abyssal habitats using submersibles to reveal the true diversity and distribution of Bathylepeta and other animals relying on such habitats,' they wrote.
Daily Mail
5 days ago
- Climate
- Daily Mail
Entire state of California enduring cold summer
The Golden State has been a lot gloomier this summer as California experiences chillier weather and cloudy conditions which experts say is set to stick around. Temperatures in the Bay Area have hovered at an average of 67 degrees, below the average of 71 and making it the coldest summer since 1965. The phenomenon is due to a layer of air near the Pacific Ocean known as the marine layer, which is formed when warm, dry air comes in contact with a cool body of water. In the summer months the warmer weather and cool water create a more dense marine layer, which causes low-hanging clouds that dampen a good beach day. 'The cooler waters off the Baja California coast have lingered through mid-July. The cooler waters have allowed upper-low pressure areas to drift into central California and enhance the marine layer for the Bay area. As a result, the low clouds have been more stubborn than normal this summer,' AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Chad Merrill told Daily Mail. He noted that the high temperate in San Francisco has been 5 degrees cooler than average and has experienced a higher frequency than normal of overcast skies. 'The onshore flow contributes to the enhanced marine layer and this onshore flow is brought on by a series of upper-lows that have been off the coast and pushed inland through the central part of the state this summer,' Merrill added. This phenomenon is unique to the West Coast because cold water in the Pacific Ocean moves south from the Gulf of Alaska . Water along the eastern Gulf Stream brings warmer tropical water north, meaning the east coast doesn't see the dense marine layer that California does. The marine layer along the east coast reforms almost daily, while along the west coast it can persist for days or weeks. San Francisco has seen a higher frequency than normal of overcast skies at 11 a.m. compared to average this summer. The cloud cover from the enhanced marine layer has allowed temperatures to trend cooler during the day. Californians have nicknamed the weather patterns as 'May Gray,' 'June Gloom,' and 'No-Sky July.' 'June gloom is so named as June can be one of the months that tends to have more persistent marine clouds than any other month,' weather expert Ken Clark with AccuWeather said. This summer season has seen a dense marine layer, resulting in colder temperatures and cloudy conditions for Californians along the coast. Greg Porter, the senior meteorologist with the San Francisco Chronicle , noted that Tuesday was the second day in a row when the entire Bay Area stayed under 80 degrees Fahrenheit. 'This cool, muted July follows an equally subdued June, driven by a combination of local ocean conditions and large-scale atmospheric patterns,' Porter said. 'Along the coast, colder than normal sea surface temperatures sharpen the marine layer, leading to thicker cloud cover, slower clearing and dampened daytime highs, even across the typically hot inland locations.' Porter predicted the gloomy conditions are here to stay until August. The forecast for parts of southern California remains chillier, with parts of San Francisco experiencing highs in the low to mid-60s. Meanwhile, those who live farther inland can potentially see drastic differences in temperatures. 'It's not uncommon to have it cloudy and in the 60s at the beaches while it's in the 80s or even 90s only 10-20 miles inland,' Clark explained. Another reason for the persistent haze off the golden coast is a pattern called the jet stream, which are narrow winds high up in the atmosphere. Porter explained that the jet stream has fallen into a semi-stationary rhythm, continuously holding over the same regions. The Earth has four primary jet streams that move weather systems from west to east. However, when a jet stream remains stationary, weather can stay relatively stagnant. 'California has been on the eastern flank of one such ridge, locked into a cool, cloudy pattern that persisted through June and July and now looks to continue into early August,' Porter said. 'Elsewhere, the same jet stream setup has delivered much more active weather from the grueling heat in Europe and Asia to the deadly flash floods across parts of the US.' The meteorologist predicted that this pattern is likely to continue through the summer, so those thinking of planning a beach vacation to the California coast may want to reconsider going west. As California experiences cooler and cloudier temperatures, other parts of the country are seeing extreme weather . Texas experienced deadly flash floods at the start of the month, killing over 137 people, while the Tri-State area reached over 100 degrees Fahrenheit in June.
Daily Mail
5 days ago
- Climate
- Daily Mail
Entire state of California enduring COLD summer thanks to bizarre weather pattern
The Golden State has been a lot gloomier this summer as California experiences chillier weather and cloudy conditions which experts say is set to stick around. Temperatures in the Bay Area have hovered at an average of 67 degrees, below the average of 71 and making it the coldest summer since 1965. The phenomenon is due to a layer of air near the Pacific Ocean known as the marine layer, which is formed when warm, dry air comes in contact with a cool body of water. In the summer months the warmer weather and cool water create a more dense marine layer, which causes low-hanging clouds that dampen a good beach day. 'The cooler waters off the Baja California coast have lingered through mid-July. The cooler waters have allowed upper-low pressure areas to drift into central California and enhance the marine layer for the Bay area. As a result, the low clouds have been more stubborn than normal this summer,' AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Chad Merrill told Daily Mail. He noted that the high temperate in San Francisco has been 5 degrees cooler than average and has experienced a higher frequency than normal of overcast skies. 'The onshore flow contributes to the enhanced marine layer and this onshore flow is brought on by a series of upper-lows that have been off the coast and pushed inland through the central part of the state this summer,' Merrill added. This phenomenon is unique to the West Coast because cold water in the Pacific Ocean moves south from the Gulf of Alaska. Water along the eastern Gulf Stream brings warmer tropical water north, meaning the east coast doesn't see the dense marine layer that California does. The marine layer along the east coast reforms almost daily, while along the west coast it can persist for days or weeks. San Francisco has seen a higher frequency than normal of overcast skies at 11 a.m. compared to average this summer. The cloud cover from the enhanced marine layer has allowed temperatures to trend cooler during the day. Californians have nicknamed the weather patterns as 'May Gray,' 'June Gloom,' and 'No-Sky July.' 'June gloom is so named as June can be one of the months that tends to have more persistent marine clouds than any other month,' weather expert Ken Clark with AccuWeather said. This summer season has seen a dense marine layer, resulting in colder temperatures and cloudy conditions for Californians along the coast. Greg Porter, the senior meteorologist with the San Francisco Chronicle, noted that Tuesday was the second day in a row when the entire Bay Area stayed under 80 degrees Fahrenheit. 'This cool, muted July follows an equally subdued June, driven by a combination of local ocean conditions and large-scale atmospheric patterns,' Porter said. 'Along the coast, colder than normal sea surface temperatures sharpen the marine layer, leading to thicker cloud cover, slower clearing and dampened daytime highs, even across the typically hot inland locations.' Porter predicted the gloomy conditions are here to stay until August. The forecast for parts of southern California remains chillier, with parts of San Francisco experiencing highs in the low to mid-60s. Meanwhile, those who live farther inland can potentially see drastic differences in temperatures. 'It's not uncommon to have it cloudy and in the 60s at the beaches while it's in the 80s or even 90s only 10-20 miles inland,' Clark explained. Another reason for the persistent haze off the golden coast is a pattern called the jet stream, which are narrow winds high up in the atmosphere. Porter explained that the jet stream has fallen into a semi-stationary rhythm, continuously holding over the same regions. The Earth has four primary jet streams that move weather systems from west to east. However, when a jet stream remains stationary, weather can stay relatively stagnant. 'California has been on the eastern flank of one such ridge, locked into a cool, cloudy pattern that persisted through June and July and now looks to continue into early August,' Porter said. 'Elsewhere, the same jet stream setup has delivered much more active weather from the grueling heat in Europe and Asia to the deadly flash floods across parts of the US.' The meteorologist predicted that this pattern is likely to continue through the summer, so those thinking of planning a beach vacation to the California coast may want to reconsider going west. As California experiences cooler and cloudier temperatures, other parts of the country are seeing extreme weather. Texas experienced deadly flash floods at the start of the month, killing over 137 people, while the Tri-State area reached over 100 degrees Fahrenheit in June.
News.com.au
20-07-2025
- Climate
- News.com.au
Tsunami warning issued after huge earthquake off the coast of Russia
A tsunami alert has been issued after multiple earthquakes struck off the cost of Russia. The strongest of those quakes, which were measured in quick succession, came in at 7.5-magnitude on the Richter scale. A tsunami watch is now in effect for the American state Hawaii, which is located in the northeast Pacific Ocean. Alerts were also issued for Guam and American Samoa, but have since been rescinded. According to the United States Geological Survey, there were three earthquakes in quick succession. The first was at 5.0-magnitude, the second at 6.7, and the last at 7.4, which was a fraction higher according to other measurements. The USGS warned that 'hazardous tsunami waves are possible' within 300 kilometres of the epicentre in the Pacific, off the city of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. That city has a population of about 160,000 people.
France 24
20-07-2025
- Science
- France 24
Restoring sea floor after mining may not be possible, researchers warn
One of the last wild zones on the planet, the sea floor is a coveted frontier for companies and countries eager to access minerals that are in high demand for emerging technologies such as electric cars. Particularly coveted are potato-sized nodules containing cobalt, nickel, copper and manganese, that are found in abundance on the seabed in the central Pacific Ocean. Companies eager to vacuum up these polymetallic nodules say they can do it with minimal risk to the deep-sea environment. But ocean defenders have battled against what they see as the advent of an industry that will threaten isolated ecosystems that are not yet well understood. That threat was underscored by European scientists who presented findings this week on the sidelines of a meeting in Kingston, Jamaica of the International Seabed Authority, which is trying to finalize future rules for seabed mining. "If we remove nodules from the seabed, we do not know what we lose, only that it's lost forever," was one of the conclusions of DEEP REST, a sea floor conservation research project. The DEEP REST study cautioned against using seabed restoration "as a management action for impacted habitats." "So far, all the restoration operations we have attempted within our DEEP REST project have been short-term. And what we observed, is that in the given time, that is to say a few years, the ecosystems do not recover," said Jozee Sarrazin, a researcher at the French Institute for Ocean Science, or Ifremer. "If restoration is possible, it will take a very long time, and at the moment we don't have the data to be able to say if that will be 100 years or 1000 years," the DEEP REST coordinator told AFP. Despite the pressure, the cold, the total darkness, and the lack of nutrition sources at the bottom of the ocean, it is teeming with life. The number of species who live on the deep seabed is not yet known but estimated to be in the millions. Soft corals, sea anemone Broad swathes of the Pacific Ocean where polymetallic nodules are found shelter fauna such as sponges, soft corals or sea anemones. The fauna "only exists in these areas because they need the hard substrate of the nodule to attach," said Matthias Haeckel of the German research center GEOMAR, which presented results of the MiningImpact project in Kingston this week. Vacuuming up these nodules and spreading sediment over the impacted areas reduces population densities, biodiversity and the functioning of ecosystems, MiningImpact's study found. "To make the story short, in the end, we're talking about recovery times of thousands of years," Haeckel said. The nodules themselves form over millions of years. Some research on restoration efforts is underway but the results are not yet in. "We designed artificial nodules made of deep-sea clay and we placed them at different sites" at depths of about 4,500 meters (14,700 feet), Sabine Gollner, a biologist at the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, told AFP. "But when you take into account the slow growth rates in the deep sea, the slow processes, it will take quite some more years to find out if restoration is effective and to what degree," she said. Massive deposits of sulfide -- a type of mineral deposit found in underwater vents that spit out seawater heated by magma -- should be off-limits, the researchers suggest. These types of underwater geysers are teeming with astonishing and unique biodiversity. "If we extract massive sulfides near active vents, we know what we lose, and we must prevent loss," the DEEP REST study says. But according to Gollner, it would be good to incorporate restoration goals into the mining code being negotiated by the International Seabed Authority's member states. "It's good to include it but with a clear statement that at this moment in time, it cannot be taken into account to reach agreed environmental goals," she said. "For example, a contractor shouldn't be allowed to use that argument to mine a larger area." © 2025 AFP
