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For more than a century, coastal observatories operated by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography have been measuring water temperatures along the California coast. This year they are flashing warning signs.<\/p>\n
Over the past three months, several observatories have set daily record highs, with the La Jolla station at one point last month recording temperatures 10 degrees above the historical average.<\/p>\n
Southern California’s waters warm every few years as tropical ocean currents move northward, a phenomenon known as El Ni\u00f1o. But the marine heatwave that began last fall was not caused by tropical ocean currents. Instead, think of a calm, sunny day with high pressure sitting over Southern California, warming both the atmosphere and oceans above historic levels. The same phenomenon is fueling an intense heat wave on the ground in California.<\/p>\n The prolonged period of ocean warming has been compared to the three-year blob, a marine heatwave caused by similar prolonged high-pressure conditions a decade ago that devastated marine life. Scientists say the coming weeks will likely determine whether this ocean heatwave disappears or evolves into something more blob-like.<\/p>\n “The biggest concern is what this year is going to be like,” said Andrew Rising, an oceanographer with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. \u201cIf the warm weather continues, followed by a strong El Ni\u00f1o, we could see even bigger impacts next fall and winter.\u201d<\/p>\n In the spring, changing atmospheric conditions commonly produce northwesterly winds that push warm surface water back into the open ocean, causing cold water from below to rise to the surface. This is a phenomenon called upwelling. Upwelling brings nutrient-rich water from deep to the surface, where it feeds phytoplankton, which plays an important role in supporting much of California’s marine life.<\/p>\n High water temperatures have cooled somewhat in recent days, raising the prospect that the heatwave may already be ending. However, it will take more time to know for sure that the heat is subsiding.<\/p>\n “The current forecast is that water temperatures as far as Southern California will likely start to cool a little bit next month, but that’s not guaranteed,” Rising said. “The concern is the sequence of events and how it unfolds.”<\/p>\n Prolonged ocean heat can have a devastating effect on phytoplankton and cause harmful algae blooms. These changes could wreak havoc on a variety of marine life, from sea lions and dolphins to shorebirds and halibut. The Year of the Blob was one of the worst Dungeness crab seasons in recent history, said Melissa Carter, a researcher at the University of California, San Diego Scripps Institution of Oceanography.<\/p>\n Such heat waves are becoming more frequent and lasting longer due to the slow warming of the oceans due to the climate crisis and changes in the atmosphere that scientists still struggle to understand.<\/p>\n “The question is: What is causing these extreme temperatures?” Carter said. “What’s the driver? That’s what we’re trying to find out.”<\/p>\n Carter said his concern is that when these high-pressure systems become established in an area, they create a “feedback loop” that tends to strengthen warmer, calmer conditions, making upwelling less likely.<\/p>\n “If these systems occur as strongly and persistently as they do year after year, they can potentially stop upwelling,” Carter said. \u201cEverything we think about the health of the West Coast ecosystem could be forever changed.\u201d<\/p>\n The remaining ocean heat offers several benefits, although they pale in comparison to the costs. When the water gets warmer, the tuna will come much closer to shore, making it easier to catch them. Surfers and swimmers also enjoy the warm waters throughout the winter.<\/p>\n “It’s fun to be in the water during a marine heatwave,” Carter said. “But our oceans shouldn’t be pools. Nothing can live in a pool. That’s not what we want.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n #Sea #temperatures #coast #Southern #California #reach #record #highs #raising #concerns #prolonged #marine #heatwave<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" For more than a century, coastal observatories operated by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography have been measuring water temperatures along the California coast. This year they are flashing warning signs. Over the past three months, several observatories have set daily record highs, with the La Jolla station at one point last month recording temperatures 10 … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":560,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,1],"tags":[985,2190,901,2196,2192,2195,2194,2193,1458,2191,1186,1302,2189],"class_list":["post-559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environment","category-general","tag-california","tag-coast","tag-concerns","tag-heatwave","tag-highs","tag-marine","tag-prolonged","tag-raising","tag-reach","tag-record","tag-sea","tag-southern","tag-temperatures"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=559"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/golliza.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}