Northeast Pacific endures fourth-largest marine heat wave on record

The Northeast Pacific ocean, off the U.S. West Coast, is experiencing its fourth-largest marine heat wave since record-keeping began in 1982. “The extent of the current Pacific marine heatwave should be surprising … but unfortunately, record breaking heat is our new norm,” Chris Free, a marine scientist at the University of California, Santa Barbara, told Mongabay. Large marine heat waves have become a recurring theme in the Northeast Pacific since the early 2010s. In 2013, the region was gripped by what was nicknamed The Blob, a massive marine heat wave that stretched from the Gulf of Alaska to Southern California. Lasting roughly three years, The Blob had catastrophic impacts on marine wildlife and ecosystems in the region and was followed by more devastating heat waves. The current Blob, officially NEP25A, first emerged in early May within the Gulf of Alaska and rapidly expanded to cover an area of about 8 million square kilometers (3.1 million square miles), roughly the size of the contiguous U.S., according to researchers with NOAA Fisheries’ California Current Integrated Ecosystem Assessment (IEA). “NEP25A gained much of its size when a low-pressure system crossing the Gulf of Alaska reversed coastal winds that had helped cool the ocean surface. The heatwave grew and approached the West Coast approximately one month ahead of other large heatwaves in recent years,” NOAA IEA notes. NEP25A is part of a much larger ongoing marine heat wave system stretching across the North Pacific, from the waters off Japan to North America’s west coast.…This article was originally published on Mongabay