Navigation
Twitter and News feeds
about 8 years ago
Manta Ray hot lunch Marianas Variety (Press Release) — The Manta Ray Band will be having a hot lunch this Saturday, Feb. 6, 2016, to raise funds for their trip to the Tumon Bay Music Festival on Guam next month. The lunches are $5 each and include fried chicken, lumpia (fried spring roll ...
about 8 years ago
gulfnews.com Whale shark sightings along UAE coast not alarming: experts gulfnews.com Dr. Elsayed Ahmad Mohammed, Regional Director, Middle East and North Africa, of International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), told Gulf News that the recent appearances of the fish make sense given the whale shark feeds close to the surface and often ... and more »
about 8 years ago
KHON2 Whale shark surprises tour group off Haleiwa KHON2 A group led by North Shore Shark Adventures was visited by a whale shark Friday morning, the intimate experience captured on video. They were about three miles off Haleiwa when the shark slowly emerged. “It swam right up to the boat, really slow ... and more »
about 8 years ago
Thanh Nien Daily Carcass of beached whale shark to be preserved by Vietnamese scientists Thanh Nien Daily The Nha Trang Oceanography Institute in central Vietnam has decided to preserve the carcass of a whale shark that died after it got caught in a fishing net last week. Fishermen and local authorities on Thursday handed over the dead fish to the institute. Giant whale shark to be embalmed for scientific researchVietNamNet Bridge all 2 news articles ...
about 8 years ago
National Geographic Manta Rays Get Crittercams for First Time Ever National Geographic We didn't think suction cups would work because manta ray skin is really rough like sand paper. We knew suction cups worked well on the smooth skin of whales. The cups were originally designed to move pieces of glass. But we gave it a try, and with a ... Scripps Grad Student Receives Prestigious Environmental FellowshipScripps Oceanography News all 4 news articles » ...
about 8 years ago
Video From a Whale Shark's Point of View National Geographic Their goal was to deploy Crittercams on whale sharks to get a glimpse of the sharks' underwater world and to better understand their behavior along the reef. Like most people, Wilhelm had never seen a whale shark. He worked on the Crittercams for about ... and more »
about 8 years ago
Zap2It Dominic Monaghan on meeting the Whale Shark: 'I had this sort of out of body experience' Zap2It “Wild Things With Dominic Monaghan” returned to Travel Channel with its third season on Wednesday (Jan. 27). The premiere, aptly titled, “Majestic Mozambique,” finds our host on the hunt for the elusive — and quite massive — Whale Shark. Early on in ... Monaghan knows where the 'Wild Things' areVirgin Islands Daily News all 9 news articles ...
about 8 years ago
CBC.ca Brian Keating swims alongside La Paz's mysterious whale sharks CBC.ca They're such huge animals," said Keating, who saw his first whale shark less than 15 minutes out of the bay. By the day's end, Keating had met at least a dozen whale sharks. He even managed to snap a few underwater photos from their tail end as proof.
about 8 years ago
FIS Fishing ban for giant manta ray FIS The Ministry of Production (Produce) has banned the capture of the giant manta ray (Manta birostris) in the Peruvian marine waters, in order to preserve this species on the coast of the country. The measure, established by a ministerial decree, is in ... and more »
about 8 years ago
The National Whale shark seen swimming in Abu Dhabi marina The National ABU DHABI // A whale shark between three and four metres long has been seen swimming in the marina at the InterContinental Abu Dhabi. Employees at the hotel first noticed the fish at 1.45pm on Friday and quickly took a video and photos to capture the ...
Search this site
Networked Blogs

Entries in abyssal (4)

Sunday
Oct032010

It's a long way down

Check out this scale figure of how deep the Marianas Trench is at Challenger Deep.  Click the image to see the original full-sized jobbie.  Oh, and if you don’t know Cthulhu

 

Via a strange circuitous route, but mostly Kevin Zelnio from Deep Sea News on Twitter. Follow him @kzelnio, and me @para_sight

 

Thursday
Jul152010

Okeanos footage

National Geographic is hosting some nice footage of a submarine volcano in Indonesia.  The video was gathered as part of the Okeanos Explorer and its current collaborative research cruise between NOAA and the Indonesian Government

The footage shows some impressive fields of stalked barnacles, an abundance of shrimp and some really cool sulfide chimneys and elemental sulfur flows.

Wednesday
Mar242010

2 of the 10 worst jobs in science

Popular Science has just published its annual "Ten worst jobs in science" issue, and two of them are in marine science!  How is this possible?  Marine science is clearly the best job since, well, ever.  Hmmmm, lets take a closer look.

1. Oceanic Snot Diver.  The name sounds gross enough, but what does it mean?  Well, it turns out that they are talking about collecting "sea snot" true enough, but to call it nasty is a bit of a beat-up, IMHO.  Scientists call this stuff "aggregates", and its an incredibly important part of the nutrient cycle in the ocean.  Really, sea snot is just the secreted mucus and fecal casts of hordes of plankton.  Wait a sec, when you write it like that, it does sound gross!  Its biggest role is in "exporting" nutrients from the surface layers of the ocean, where the sun sponsors all that plankton growth, to the dark depths, where sunlight never penetrates, but life nonetheless thrives.  Not only do some animals down there eat the stuff (ew), but at those crushing depths, some of the snot also dissolves under the immense pressure of all the water above it, much like snow melting before it reaches the ground.  In this way, the snot plays a very important part in taking nutrients produced at the surface, and dissolving them in the water at great depths.  Maybe not the most attractive concept, but pretty important in the grand scheme of things.  Like Tom Cruise says in The Firm: "Its not sexy, but its got teeth". 

2. Whale slasher.  OK, I have to concede that one.  I've seen a few stranded whales being cut up on the beach (this is called a necropsy, not an autopsy, which is reserved for people only), and it pongs.  I'm not talking sweat sock pong, or even doggy-breath-after-eating-goose-poo pong, but serious, invasive, gets-into-your-hair, throw-your-clothes-away stink.  While the cause of death is always interesting, wading through week-old whale giblets that have been baking on the beach?  Not so fresh...

Friday
Dec182009

Try fitting *this* into a bedside lamp

Work reported in Nature today from a presentation at the annual AGU meeting shows easily the deepest underwater volcano ever filmed.  The eruption was filmed from a remote submarine at 1200m depth - far more than the previous 500m depth record - and shows lava bursting out onto the sea floor.  The discovery helps scientists understand how pillow basalts form and how sea floor materials are added to the oceanic crust.

Its hard to imagine how extreme that process is.  We're talking hot enough to melt lead, at pressures that would turn a styrofoam cup into a thimble!