Seven storage tanks were built to store contaminated water, which is in turn used to keep reactor cores and spent fuel pools stable during the decades-long decommissioning process.The facility’s No. 2 tank was found to be leaking on April 5 and released some 120 tons of contaminated water, and the No. 3 tank began to leak on April 7. TEPCO has been urged to prevent the toxic runoff from reaching the ocean, which thus far seems to have been avoided. … Read More
South Africa creates offshore marine refuge
South Africa has turned two small islands in the southern Indian Ocean into its first offshore marine protected area, the environment ministry said Tuesday. The protected status for the windswept Prince Edward islands, lying 1,777 kilometres (1,104 miles) from the South African mainland, aims in…
Scientists plan diving quest to study ‘living fossil’ coelacanth
French and South African biologists will dive to deep-sea caves in the Indian Ocean next month in a bid to locate the coelacanth, the “living fossil” fish whose history predates the dinosaurs, France’s National Museum of Natural History said on Friday. The “Gombessa”…
Scientists study world’s largest creature by tracking its song
An Australian-led group of scientists has for the first time tracked down and tagged Antarctic blue whales by using acoustic technology to follow its songs, the government said Wednesday. The blue whale, the largest animal on the planet, is rarely spotted in the Southern Ocean but a group of…
James Cameron donates Deepsea Challenger one-person sub to science
Film-maker and explorer hands one-man craft that plunged him to Pacific Ocean’s deepest point to oceanographic institute James Cameron has donated the one-man submarine within which he descended to the bottom of the planet’s deepest chasm last year to the largest independent…
Tortoises thrive on coral atoll where the creatures outnumber humans 10,000-to-one
It is perhaps not surprising that there are only a handful of humans on one of the most remote islands on Earth, coral atolls far out in the turquoise seas of the Indian Ocean. What is unexpected are the 100,000 giant tortoises — more than are found on the world famous Galapagos Islands…
Marine biologists: Small fish trawling leads to more jellyfish
Marine biologists say they have proof that excessive trawling of small fish species leads to proliferation of jellyfish, a worsening phenomenon whose causes have been unclear. The scientists monitored ecosystems in two ocean zones a thousand kilometres (600 miles) apart, traversed by the same…
