• the European Union closed the bluefin tuna fishing season in the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean, calling the stocks “exhausted” …
  • a developer proposed dredging up 2.6 million cubic yards of sand from the ocean floor in order to build an artificial beach in Nantucket. The developer will replace the 105 acres of seabed habitat with 28,000 concrete railroad ties over 60 acres …
  • A New York coastal manager told the state government that its 3,200 miles of coastline were in danger from pollution and overfishing. “New York was born on the waterfront, and its future depends on managing those resources,” he said …
  • Australian authorities detained 61 crew members of six illegal fishing boats. A catch of trepang, a sea slug, was found on board one of the ships. It was thrown back into the water …
  • federal officials proposed dumping “cleaner materials” on top of the Mud Dump Site, a spot off the coast of New Jersey, where toxic mud was dumped throughout the 20th century. The idea is to create a muffin-shaped protective cover over what is now essentially a pollution pancake …
  • researchers working in an undersea lab in Florida’s coral reefs put up a series of webcams, allowing viewers to watch the interior of the lab or get a diver’s-eye view with a camera mounted to scuba gear …
  • the Pacific nation of Tuvalu appealed to the world to combat global warming. The island nation rests two meters above sea level and could disappear in the next 50 years as water levels rise …
  • experts were puzzled by the second stranding of a thresher shark on a New York beach in as many weeks …
  • for the first time since last year, striped bass migrated from the ocean to San Pablo Bay in California. Historically, the bass come every spring. No one knows why they are late this year …
  • a 78-foot-long, 100,000 lb. blue whale carcass washed up on a beach near Ventura, California. The cause of death is unknown. The carcass will be towed to a nearby RV camping ground for inspection. “There will be some unhappy campers, as they say,” a county official said …
  • and Sen. Barbara Boxer cooed over Ted Danson’s decades-long dedication to oceans advocacy. The exchange took place in a new episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”