'The Blob' Returns
Temperature anomalies (orange-red), 9-2014 & 9-2019 (credit: NOAA)
The infamous 'blob' has returned. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), The Blob, a marine heatwave that reached the US West Coast in 2014 disrupting returning salmon, has now returned. The zone of exceptionally warm ocean water has developed in the same way, is in the same location, and is almost the same size. During the 2014 marine heatwave, toxic algal blooms occurred in the warmer waters which killed seals and sea birds.
The new hot mass stretches from the Gulf Alaska to southern California covering an area approximately 4 million square miles in the western Pacific Ocean. Water temperatures have been measured 5-7F above normal. So far, cold water along the coast has kept The Blob offshore. The cold water upwelling is driven by winds which often wane in the fall. The ocean heatwave could move onshore affecting coastal temperatures, which has happened along Washington's coast already, if the winds recede.
NOAA is particularity concerned about potential impacts to fish stocks in the hotter water. During the 2014-15 heatwave only lower-quality food was available for immature salmon entering the ocean from western rivers. It also shifted predators in ways that negatively contributed to low returns of mature salmon to spawn. Fisheries ecologist Nate Manuta commented on the new "blob" saying:
“We learned with the first 'blob’ and similar events worldwide, that what used to be unexpected is becoming more common. We are fundamentally altering the heat balance across the whole planet."
Since carbon dioxide is mostly absorbed by the world's oceans, climate change impacts such as super-hurricanes, bleached coral reefs, or marine heatwaves are now unfolding in many and dangerous ways.
WHB