After a large crude-oil spill by the Spanish-owned Repsol oil refinery caused suspension of fishing in Peru, more than 2,500 fishermen have been out of work. Those affected are on the poverty line and it remains unclear when they can return to fish.  - CSMonitor

Mashona Dlamini knew his land was rich long before any mining company told him so.  As a child, he often followed his father, a healer called an inyanga, down through the silver-flecked red dunes around their village to the coast. There, they gathered the octopuses, sea urchins, and seawater that his father used to make medicine. In winter, the land on either side of their path heaved up sweet potatoes and corn, in summer thick bunches of bananas. As long as they took only what they needed, Mr. Dlamini’s father explained as they walked, there would always be more. So when international mining companies began to arrive in the early 2000s – first for titanium in the dunes, and later for gas they said might be beneath the ocean floor – Mr. Dlamini, along with many of his neighbors, wasn’t particularly interested in their pitch.  - CS Monitor

Waikiki might be one of the most famous beaches in the world, a synonym for surfing and sun-soaked vacations that draw millions of people annually. But for years, Honolulu and the State of Hawaii have been reckoning with a very uncomfortable fact: The beach is vanishing. Just below the infinity pool at the Sheraton Waikiki, an advancing shoreline claimed a walkway and set of concrete stairs, which now dangle above the water. At the Outrigger Reef hotel, ocean water laps directly against the wall of the new Monkeypod Kitchen restaurant, still under renovation. - Politico

Sandbars along the Colorado River are used as campsites by river runners and hikers and are an important recreational resource within Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona. Regulation of the flow of river water through Glen Canyon Dam has reduced the amount of sediment available to be deposited as sandbars, has reduced the magnitude and frequency of flooding events, and has increased the magnitude of baseflows. This has caused widespread erosion of sandbars and has allowed native and non-native vegetation to expand on open sand. Previous studies show an overall decline in campsite area despite the use of controlled floods to rebuild sandbars. Monitoring of campsites since 1998 has shown changes in campsite area, but the factors that cause gains and losses in campsite area have not been quantified. These factors include changes in sandbar volume and slope under different dam flow regimes that include controlled floods, gul- lying caused by monsoonal rains, vegetation expansion, and reworking of sediment by aeolian processes. - USGS

Each day after the tide went out, workers piled enormous rocks onto the sandy beach.  They were rushing to dump at least 11,000 tons to keep the ocean at bay and reopen a picturesque stretch of railroad track in San Clemente.  In the nearby Cyprus Shores gated community, cracks recently began surfacing in the clubhouse and several multimillion-dollar homes. The tracks were shut down last month after large waves swept in and the ground became unstable.  The forces at work along this beach and the rest of the California coast cannot, in the long run, be stopped by a stack of boulders. Climate change has led to rising sea levels, which translates to more intense battering of beachside communities. - LA Times

When Hurricane Ida barreled into the Louisiana coast with near 150 mile-per-hour winds on Aug. 30, it left a trail of destruction. The storm also triggered the most oil spills detected from space after a weather event in the Gulf of Mexico since the federal government started using satellites to track spills and leaks a decade ago.  In the two weeks after Ida, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued a total of 55 spill reports, including a spill near a fragile nature reserve. It underscores the frailty of the region’s offshore oil and gas infrastructure to intensifying storms fueled by climate change. - NY Times

Russia's top criminal investigation agency on Thursday probed an oil spill off the country's Black Sea coast that appeared hugely bigger than initially reported.  The spill occurred over the weekend at the oil terminal in Yuzhnaya Ozereyevka near the port of Novorossiysk that belongs to the Caspian Pipeline Consortium, which pumps crude from Kazakhstan. The oil spilled while being pumped into the Minerva Symphony tanker, which sails under the Greek flag. - Phys.Org

Oceanside’s annual harbor dredging and the occasional regional sand replenishment projects are not enough to save the city’s eroding beaches, a new study shows.  A proposal to build rock groins on the beach appears to be the best way to stop or at least slow the steady erosion that has been chewing away the city’s coastline since the 1940s, according to the study prepared for Oceanside by the Long Beach-based consulting firm GHD.  “Sand from this (harbor dredging) program does little to really benefit the city beaches,”  -San Diego Union

The collapse of the condominium building in Surfside, Florida, may force what some say is a long overdue conversation about the hard realities of climate change that will transform one of the nation’s most vulnerable regions.  To be sure, no evidence has emerged so far to connect climate change to the middle-of-the-night collapse of the Champlain Towers on June 24, which buried residents in the rubble. Sea level has risen eight inches in South Florida since 1981, when the 12-story condo was built—not enough to be responsible for its collapse, says Hal Wanless, a University of Miami geologist and South Florida’s preeminent voice on sea-level rise.  The investigation so far is more focused on a confluence of events including delays by the homeowners association in carrying out recommended repairs and an environmental danger that’s been known for more than a century: the corrosive effects of salt water on coastal construction. - National Geographic

In 2017 around 1.05 million deaths were avoidable by eliminating fossil fuel combustion, according to a study published in the science journal Nature Communications. The largest number of these deaths occurred in world’s two most populous countries - China and India. Air pollution caused due to combustion of coal alone contributed to half of these deaths. Residential, industry and energy sectors were other dominant global sources of fossil fuel emissions. The study indicates that replacing traditional energy sources will have substantial health benefits. - Forbes / Nature

While some "news" channels and Facebook "experts" dispute the reality of human made climate change, those changes already are affecting Miami.  - NYTimes

It is good to know that we can worth with nature. 

​Like many port cities in the Philippines, Iloilo City is susceptible to intense flooding and massive landslides each year. In 2011, the government completed the construction of an artificial waterway—the Jaro Floodway—to help divert floodwaters away from the city and mitigate the deadly events. But the new channel also brought an unexpected surprise: a resurgence of mangrove trees. - NASA Earth Observatory

How bad is the problem? Our new research provides the first global estimate of microplastics on the seafloor - our research suggests there’s a staggering 8-14 million tonnes of it. This is up to 35 times more than the estimated weight of plastic pollution on the ocean’s surface. - Inverse from Frontiers in Marine Science