ISAV, infectious Salmon Anemia Virus. What's in the Salmon you eat?
Thursday, March 27, 2008
ISAV, infectious salmon anemia virus was first reported in Norway in 1984. In Norway the virus was thought to be controlled by biocontainment measures.
In January 2000 with health certifications the ban of sea water in smolt farms along with transportation vehicle hygiene and regulations on fish slaughterhouses ISAV was reduced. A paper written by Dr. Eric Anderson, at the University of Maine said, "despite these efforts, ISAV is now endemic in Norway and will pose an on going problem to the industry."
Today the NYtimes is reporting that ISAV is killing millions of salmon being farmed off the waters of Chile. Dr. Felipe C. Cabello, at New York Medical College in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology in Valhalla says," Parasitic infections, viral infections, fungal infections are all disseminated when the fish (north atlantic salmon) are stressed and the centers are too close together." Cabello thinks all these problems are "related to an underlying lack of sanitary controls."
The NYtimes is reporting that high levels of antibiotics have been used in the aquafarming of salmon in recent years stemming from a rash of nonviral illnesses from which the fish were suffering. Some of those antibiotics are prohibited in use on animals in the U.S.
The Times article says 29 percent of Chilean salmon is destined to reach the U.S. in spite of those bans. In Chili there is still no registry to track the use of banned drugs on the fish landing in the U.S. or anywhere else.
Apparently the vast majority of salmon infected with the disease end up in Costco and Safeway stores as well as other major outlets in the U.S.
No one wants to hear is that the Salmon she has been buying at Costco is infected with anything. The second least favorite thing to hear is that due to sanitary conditions the fish has been pumped full of antibiotics.
Environmentalists are saying that salmon farms are contributing to the deadzones in the oceans. Salmon feces and food pellets are stripping the water of oxygen.
The O.E.C.D.,Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in a 2005 said Chile's aquafarming needs to get a grip on approximately 1 million salmon that escape each year from aquafarms and excessive use of antibiotics and the use of fungicides like green malachite control the use of fungicides like green malachiteand the excessive use of antibiotics.
Alaska Ranger Sinking. 47 Crew Being Rescued Near Alaska.
26 members of the 180-foot Alaska Ranger have been rescued from life boats. The Seattle based fishing boat started taking on water after losing control of its rudder This morning around 3a.m.
Komo TV Seattle is reporting all 47 crew members abandoned ship and made it safely to life rafts. No injuries have been reported so far. The rafts are in 6 to 8 foot seas being pushed by approximately 25 knot winds which is said to be rough weather for life rafts, but it could be worse.
The boat was about 120 miles west of Dutch Harbor, Alaska. The boat is a catcher-processing vessel operated by the Fishing Company of Alaska.
The Alaska Ranger's sister ship, the Alaska Warrior was nearby and is helping the Coast Guard in the rescue.
According to a report at NOAA, in 2001-2004 the Fishing Company of Alaska, through its agents, committed numerous violations, including: tampering with or destroying observer's samples and equipment; failing to provide observers a safe work area; failing to notify observers prior to bringing fish aboard to allow sampling of the catch; failing to provide reasonable assistance to observers; and interfering with or biasing sampling procedure employed by observers.
The fine for these actions, which came in 2006, was $254,500.00 for violations of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The fishing vessel Alaska Juris's 3 captains were also assessed a protion of that civil penalty. The charges were a result of a multiple-year investigation conducted by special agents in the Alaska division of NOAA Fisheries Service's Office of Law Enforcement.
Ocean Dead Zones Observation Left Twisting In The Wind.
Friday, March 21, 2008
The White House's proposed budget for fiscal year 2009 restored a bit of good news for 3 of 5 key climate instruments crucial in tracking earth changes. CERES, a sensor to measure the Earth's radiation, another instrument that tracks solar irradiance and the OMPS-Limb instrument (Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite) all received a sentence commute in the proposed 2009 budget.
The death sentence handed down to 2 other instruments intended to measure sea-surface temperatures and wind directions over the oceans were left twisting in the wind.
Given the fact that scientists, on a whole, generally behave in an unflappable manner hearing words and phrases such as; 'alarm bells', 'borders on criminal negligence','devastating', 'grave jeopardy' and 'blinding' do not evoke feelings of confidence in the future. Since blowing winds and sea-surface temperatures are two key ingredients increasing the dead zones in our oceans.
A panel of scientists at the annual American Association for the Advancement of Science held in Boston last month reported...Climate change is rapidly transforming the world's oceans by increasing the temperature and acidity of seawater, and altering atmospheric and oceanic circulation...
In the past ocean dead zones could be attributed to fertilizers, farm run-off, and sewage which over fed phytoplankton which are eaten by bacteria when they die that use up the oxygen in the water. These dead zones in the past were more likely to be found in places where rivers run into the oceans like the Mississippi into the Gulf of Mexico, but more dead zones are being found in the open oceans.
We need to have more ability to observe these growing dead zones, not less.
Image NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
On March 18 NASA released a report on Arctic Sea Ice. Global Warming Nay-Sayers are spinning some facts in the report to shore up their argument that Global Warming a vast left wing conspiracy while most mainstream media have made little mention of the report.
At the heart of the study is the perennial sea ice. Perennial sea ice is "old ice". In fact Walt Meier, National Snow and Ice Data Center calls the oldest ice "tough as nails". Perennial ice is ice that is more than a year old.
While this March NASA's Aqua satellite, NOAA and U.S. Defense Department satellites showed a slight increase of 3.9 percent over the previous 3 years it is still below the long-term average by 2.2 percent. The increase in the ice occurred due to surface temperatures that were colder than the historical averages.
Most troubling was the area of perennial ice has decreased to an all-time minimum.
On the heels of the 'new ice' comes the summer melt season. The new ice is much thinner. The thick and hardy perennial ice used to cover 50-60% of the Arctic, this year it covers less than 30%.
The 'tough as nails' very old ice that remains in the Arctic for at least 6 years made up 20% of the Arctic area in the mid to late 80's. This winter the tough stuff had decreased to just a tiny 6%.
According to NASA Polar ice reflects light from the sun. As this ice begins to melt, less sunlight gets reflected back into space. The sun is instead absorbed into the oceans and land raising the overall temperature and fueling further melting. This results in a positive feedback loop called ice albedo feedback. The more the ice disappears, the more likely it is to continue to disappear.
Photo Thanks: NASA In September 2007, the Northwest Passage was ice-free for the first time since satellite records began.
It will be interesting to see the comparison of this image with the September 2008 when it is taken.
Just when Malcolm Smith, a New Zealand Conservation Department officer was thinking all would be lost, he received help for a familiar Mahia beach local. That local's name is Moko, a female bottlenose dolphin.
Smith said he as he became cold, wet and tired Moko came to the rescue of the two whales. She seemed to communicate something to them and then guided the whales to safety.
Smith thinks Moko's intervention with the whales did make the difference between life and death for them. Smith had tried to push the pair back out to sea, but they were having nothing to do with that action.
Moko is best known for playing with local swimmers and pushing kayaks through the water with her snout.
Smith said the dolphin made contact with the whales and "basically escorted them about 200 yards parallel with the beach to the edge of the sandbar. Then she did a right-angle turn through quite a narrow channel and escorted them out to sea."
The two haven't been seen since Monday but, Moko is back to her playful antics.
The winds weren't strong and the waves weren't high. So what caused yet another oil tanker accident in South Korean waters?
Yeosu, meaning 'beautiful waters' is the location of the latest oil tanker accident to hit South Korean waters. The collision was between Heungyang a 4,050 ton tanker and the 90 ton 801 Changnyeong, this according to chosun.com.
The spill was 'light' when comparing it to the spill late last year that took place off the coast of Mallipo. That spill contaminated the Yellow Sea with more than 12 thousand kiloliters of oil. The devestating effects of that spill still have yet to be calculated in totality. This latest accident is said to have spilled only 50 kiloliters of diesel oil. The Coast guard said the damage from the latest collision will cause only minor damage, as diesel oil evaporates easily.
The accident is being reported by ABC news that the tanker collided with a small boat.
Meanwhile residents in the Taean area may see some financial relief coming their way but, not until the middle of June. The Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs announced a special law to support residents affected by the December 7, 2007 tragedy. The rules on compensation should be finalized by late May.
The International Oil Pollution Compensation Funds have agreed to hand out up to $300.8 million dollars to those suffering in the aftermath of the Hebei Spirit Oil Spill. The government estimates about 45,000 households have been crushed under the weight of the oil spill.
Rep Bart Gordon, chairman Committee on Science and Technology said in his opening statement, "EPA executed a failed process for modernizing their library network."
Rep Brad Miller, "The most generous interpretation is incompetence - that EPA managers grossly mismanaged their library system." Miller also said it may take years and a lot of money to set things right again.
When the EPA closed its largest regional library in Chicago it sold all of its fixtures, valued at more than $40,000.00 for less than $350.00. I'm not sure anyone can that is surprising information.
The Office of Enforcement and Compliance (OECA), will be left holding perhaps nothing more than thin and polluted air when it's time to prosecute Eco-felons. 1. Information access; especially to original documents. 2. Worry that the centralized system EPA is espousing may not meet tight court-imposed deadlines. 3. Cost. And, how it will be funded?
One of the more interesting notes of irony is that apparently the agency did not anticipate copyright restrictions as they apply to making digitized copies of some material.
In February a federal arbitrator found the EPA guilty of unfair labor practices and acting in bad faith in its national series of library closures. The EPA was ordered to bargain with affected public employee unions before making any further changes in its library network. On more slice of irony, the EPA acted without benefit of any employee input regarding the actions it has taken.
The GAO, Government Accountability Office found the decision to close the libraries wasn't justified and it deprived the public, EPA staff, state and local agencies and academics of valuable environmental data.
Is A New Stage Being Set For Apocalypse? Theater in the round, under the Northern Lights, on top of the World.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Maybe our eyes have been turned toward the wrong venue for the long anticipated Apocalypse. Maybe the final war will not be fought for what lies under the sand, but for what lies under the ice.
Last month the United States and Canada signed a little publicized "Civil Assistance Plan". The U.S. and Canada have a long history of working in concert with the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) being the most familiar to the public. So why not celebrate this new Civil Assistance Plan?
David Pugliese, Ottawa Citizen's defence reporter, is asking why all the secrecy surrounding this new signed agreement. The agreement was signed without the U.S. Congress or the Canadian Parliament.
Indeed why all the secrecy? The agreement merely allows the military from one nation to support the military forces of the other during a civil emergency. It sounds like a good idea on the face of it. Maybe the agreement has nothing to do with flu pandemics, earthquakes or domestic emergencies.
Peter McKay, Canadian Defence Minister may think I have my tinfoil hat pulled down too tightly over my head but I'm thinking my idea may be as good as the next guys. I'm wondering if this agreement isn't more about the Arctic Meltdown than anything else.
Scott G. Borgerson, international affairs Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and former Lieutenant Commander in the U.S. Coast Guard has written a nearly 6 page small font single spaced article for FOREIGN AFFAIRS, published by the Council on Foreign Relations. The Article's Title; Arctic Meltdown. The Economic and Security Implications of Global Warming.
In his paper Borgerson points out Gazprom, the Russian state-controlled oil company has approximately 113 Trillion cubic feet of gas already under development in the Barents Sea and the calculated oil in the territory claimed by Moscow could be as much as 586 billion barrels of oil. With literally billions more barrels of oil and trillions more of gas in the region it isn't any wonder that the former Lieutenant Commander thinks the Arctic could descend into armed conflict.
There are 5 Arctic powers already trying to carve up, lay claim and otherwise declare the vast, heretofore, uncovered resources as their own.
The trillions upon trillions of dollars of resources are only the tip of the proverbial iceberg. As Borgerson also brings forward, millions upon millions of dollars will be saved by the shipping industry as the shortcuts of the Northern Sea Route and the Northwest Passage open up due to global warming. Toss in the incredible financial boon to the mega container ships, now too large to navigate the Panama and Suez Canals, and anyone could imagine where this tale will end.
The 'Civil Assistance Plan was signed by U.S. Air Force Gen. Gene Renuat commander of North American Aerospace Defense Command and U.S. Northern Command and by Lt. General Marc Dumais, commander Canada command. The signing was announced on the Northcom website
Is Global Warming Producing Its First Civil War? In the U.S. no less.
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Georgia is a dry state. This doesn't mean they still don't enjoy their Mint Juleps. Georgia is still running out of water. It's a good thing only 1 tablespoon of water is called for in the making of what's known as 'the world's most civilized' drink.
Civility may be called for, sans the bourbon, if the water war between Georgia and Tennessee gets any hotter.
Georgia lawmakers intend to take a legal look at what has been a 190 year-old border dispute with Tennessee. At issue is what Georgia claims is an 1818 survey of the state line which is in error. The 1.1 mile mistake hasn't been in much dispute over the past couple of hundred years, but what a difference a mile can make when your state is running dry.
Moving the state boundary just over a mile to the north would give the particularly parched state of Georgia a portion of the wet Tennessee River.
The mayor of Chattanooga intends to have a truckload of water delivered to Georgia Lawmakers along with a proclamation setting aside one day as "Give Our Georgia Friends a Drink Day."
Sen. David Shafer, R-Duluth thinks Chattanooga mayor Littlefield's delivery of water a nice gesture but also described Littlefield's actions as "posturing".
Littlefield said Tuesday, "We hope they accept it in the humorous way it is intended."
Georgia's Drought is no laughing matter. Just as border disputes between states isn't funny either. What begins in jest, ends in earnest.
Take a look around this weekly updated drought page to see how 'in earnest' Georgia's border dispute may become.
