Water & Oceans

"After decades of recovery, right whales are now under threat from industrial fishing".

"Rising seas caused by climate change are seeping inside a United States nuclear waste dump on a remote and low-lying Pacific atoll, flushing out radioactive substances left behind from some of the world’s largest atomic weapons tests."

"The only road to Rigolet, Labrador, is the ice. But climate change is making that ice vanish, and the mental health impact runs deep."

"ON SEA ICE NEAR RIGOLET, Labrador — Leaning over the handlebars with one knee up on the seat, Derrick Pottle commanded his snowmobile between rocks and sheets of gray sea ice before stopping suddenly at the mouth of a bay.

“It’s open,” Mr. Pottle said, turning off his machine. Ten yards away, the ice had cracked and opened a dark hole in the water that made it impossible to drive across the inlet.

"Mexico’s government has created a marine park the size of Illinois in the Pacific, the largest ocean reserve in North America for the conservation of giant rays, whales and turtles, including dozens of species endemic to the area."

"ST. JOSEPH, Louisiana – On a hot delta day, Roy Bowman fills a gallon jug from an Army green trailer-mounted water tank. All year, Bowman and his neighbors in this crushingly poor, mostly African American town perched on the west bank of the Mississippi River have gotten their water this way."

"MONROE, Mich. — Competing in a bass fishing tournament two years ago, Todd Steele cast his rod from his 21-foot motorboat — unaware that he was being poisoned."

The law and regulations make it hard for the U.S. EPA to regulate new chemicals in drinking water. A lot of testing is required to show the chemical is harmful and found widely in water. New analysis of existing data shows a family of chemicals that includes perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, may be doing much more harm than EPA admits.

"After announcing on Sunday the city’s intent to sue U.S. Steel for polluting Lake Michigan, Mayor Rahm Emanuel blasted the company and federal environmental regulators who’ve been “asleep at the switch” under the Trump administration."

"A pivotal EPA study provided the rationale for exemptions that helped unleash the fracking boom. The science was suppressed to protect industry interests."