Mega sargassum formation threatens the coasts of Cancun

A “Sargasso stain” of 550 kilometers in diameter will arrive in the coming days to the coasts of Quintana Roo, on the Caribbean coast, the Monitoring Network on the macroalgae warned on Monday June 24.

The Monitoring Network is a citizen observatory that uses information from 20 institutions, including the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), to inform, prevent and alert of the arrival of sargassum to the Mexican coasts of the Caribbean.

“A significant accumulation of sargassum has been concentrated for the last two weeks west of the Caribbean island of Jamaica,” the network said on its social media pages.

The network explained that this great “Sargasso stain” is more than 550 kilometers in diameter and is about 1,000 kilometers east from the coasts of Quintana Roo.

He said that “due to the prevailing currents and the direction of the south-southeast winds, the “stain” is expected to arrive on the shores of Mexico “sometime next week.”

The network predicted sargassum beds “of medium to high intensity in practically along the entire coast of Quintana Roo, affecting mainly the central and southern region of the state,” some 260 kilometers of coastline between Tulum and Xcalak (including th coasts of the Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve), on the border with Belize. The Mexican government said the issue of sargasso is being addressed as a “state problem” and no private companies will be hired to collect the seaweed.

In a press conference with President Andrés Manuel López Obrador in Cancún, the Secretary of the Navy, José Rafael Ojeda, said there are 995 kilometers of coastline affected, and he declared that sargassum “is not a problem, it is a situation “that occurs in several countries (whatever he meant)…

During that press conference Andres Manuel López Obrador stated that the sargassum situation and other issues are being “magnified” in order to make his administration look bad.

The Yucatan Times
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