Troubled Waters

Troubled Waters

Source: earthobservatory

9/25/2021

It was once a source of great abundance—particularly fossil fuels and fish—for the people of Venezuela. Now Lake Maracaibo is mostly abundant with pollution from leaking oil and excess nutrients.

Spanning 13,000 square kilometers (5,000 square miles) in northwestern Venezuela, Lake Maracaibo is one of South America’s largest lakes and one of the oldest in the world. Though it was filled with freshwater thousands of year ago, Maracaibo is now an estuarine lake connected to the Gulf of Venezuela and the Caribbean Sea by a narrow strait. That strait was significantly expanded in the 1930–50s by dredging for ship traffic. Now the north end of the lake is brackish, while the south end is mostly fresh due to abundant flows from nearby rivers.

In satellite images acquired in September 2021, Lake Maracaibo was swirling with shades of green, tan, and gray that traced the flow of currents and eddies. The sources of those colors were algae, river sediment outflows, and crude oil leaks. The image at the top of this page was acquired by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite on September 25. The Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8 observed the scene below on September 10.

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News Id		Source	Stamp	country
4776	New fish species found off Taitung	taipeitimes	2005-05-28	TW
4777	In River of Many Aliens, Snakehead Looms as Threat	Washington Post	2005-05-28	US
4778	Foiling fugitive fish	innovations	2005-02-21	CA
4779	Scientist finds little surprise lurking at bottom of the harbour	smh	2005-07-11	CA
4780	Sinking Fish May Fast-Track Mercury Pollution to the Deep Sea	eos.org	2020-12-22	US
4781	Mint pollution kills 6,000 fish	bbc news	2005-07-04	UK
4782	How fish hear and make sounds at same time	innovations	2005-04-07	US
4783	Fishy secret of why men attract	bbc news	2005-03-22	UK
4784	Researcher Focuses on Atka Mackerel	NOAA	2005-03-18	US
4785	'Cowardly and selfish' act hits Turtles Kingston conservation effort		2020-08-24	CA
4786	Where goldfish come from	CNN/Money	2005-03-21	US
4787	Multiple genes permit closely related fish species to mix and match their color vision	eurekalert	2005-10-10	UK
4788	Angler floored by monster catch	bbc news	2005-08-01	UK
4789	Haddock catch plan sparks anger	bbc news	2005-10-21	UK
4790	Ban on long-line commercial fishing may be lifted / Restyled hook won't spare sea turtles, opponents contend	sfgate	2005-08-05	US
4791	New species are being found in record numbers in the river. Now TV viewers have a chance to name one of them	theguardian	2005-04-03	UK
4792	Criminal probe into Barents chase	bbc news	2005-11-01	UK
4793	Fish reveal hidden depths	theguardian	2005-04-15	UK
4794	Scientists call for urgent action to save Atlantic tuna	theguardian	2005-04-28	UK
4795	Some fish like it hot	abc news	2005-04-27	NZ
4796	Tuna fears exaggerated	starbulletin	2005-04-30	US
4797	Quarter of Irish sea cod 'illegal'	bbc news	2005-12-07	IE
4798	'Splash' R.I.P.; Former World Record Blue Catfish Turns Fins Up	underwatertimes	2005-12-09	US
4799	Risk assessments urged for fish escaping from net-pen aquaculture	innovations-report	2005-03-05	US
4800	How an Israeli scientist changed the piscine world	clevelandjewishnews	2005-12-08	IL

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