May 14, 2018 — The Gulf of Mexico’s dead zone is bigger than ever. Recent surveys put it at an enormous 8,776 square miles, large enough to cover New Jersey.

But another massive zone of low dissolved oxygen confirmed recently in the Arabian Sea is seven times larger. At 63,000 square miles — the size of Florida — it ranks as the world’s largest.

Scientists from the University of East Anglia of Norwich, England measured the dead zone, which sits in the Gulf of Oman south of Iran, with underwater robots. The area had been suspected of hosting a massive dead zone, but roving bands of pirates and the region’s volatile geopolitics made research difficult. The torpedo-shaped robots were able to slip in and do the measurements with ease, but they came back with very bad news.

“The Arabian Sea is the largest and thickest dead zone in the world,” said Bastien Queste, a marine biochemist and the study’s lead author. “But until now, no one really knew how bad the situation was because of piracy and conflicts in the area have made it too dangerous to collect data.”

Waters depleted of oxygen turn fish away and suffocate anything that can’t escape, including plants and slow-moving crabs and other shellfish.

“Of course all fish, marine plants and other animals need oxygen, so they can’t survive there,” Queste said. “It’s a real environmental problem with dire consequences for humans, too.”

In the Gulf of Mexico, the growing dead zone has had a big impact on commercial fisheries. Shrimp are harder to find and the oxygen-starved crustaceans are slow to grow, producing a smaller shrimp that fetches lower prices.

Read the full story at the New Orleans Times-Picayune