Authorities across the Caribbean are releasing emergency funding to clean up piles of decaying seaweed so huge and pungent that tourists have cancelled summer beach holidays and lawmakers on Tobago have deemed it a “natural disaster”.
The picture-perfect beaches and turquoise waters that people expect from the Caribbean are increasingly being fouled by mats of plant matter that attract biting sand fleas and smell like rotten eggs.
Clumps of the brownish seaweed, known as sargassum, have long washed up on Caribbean coastlines, but researchers say the algae have exploded in extent and frequency in recent years.
From the Dominican Republic in the north, to Barbados in the east, and Mexico’s Caribbean resorts to the west, officials are authorizing emergency money to clear stinking mounds of seaweed that in some cases have piled up to nearly three meters (10 feet) high on beaches, choked scenic coves and cut off moored boats. Read More
