Depression marks on seafloor suggest whales visiting prospective mining sites

https://phys.org/news/2018-08-depression-seafloor-whales-prospective-sites.html

by dnetesn • 8 years ago

62 36 8 years ago

mc32• 8 years ago

To me this headline is phrased in a way that gives the impression that whales are visiting places because they are prospective mining sites (maybe curious). However, the text makes clear that that outfits are exploring places which coincidentally seem to be used by whales --if confirmed mining plans may need to be altered.

[in other words it implies some causation, but there appears to be none]

mojomark• 8 years ago

Totally read the headline the same way. I thought sea life were fighting 'the man' for a moment.

Alternative [more responsible?] headline: Newly Conjectured Whale Habitat May Thwart Deep Sea Mining Prospects

ianai• 8 years ago

Where’s the “thwart”? It’s open ocean between Hawaii and Mexico. I don’t know of any political force to stop development regardless.

PakG1• 8 years ago

Newly Conjectured Whale Habitat May Thwart Deep Sea Mining Prospects

I'd still read that as whales fighting 'the man', as in, they need to defend their natural home turf from destructive resource harvesting, ala Ferngully or Avatar.

userbinator• 8 years ago

The sentence is a bit unusually phrased; I parsed it several times as prospective mining sites being visited by depressed whales and became rather puzzled.

ChuckMcM• 8 years ago

And in my quick first read I thought they were accusing the whales of making 4000 meter deep tracks (which would be a serious mining operation for a whale!) as opposed to finding tracks at a depth of 4000m, which makes way more sense.

code_duck2• 8 years ago

Right, it should be phrased the other way around - researchers find that prospective mining sites are being placed in deep locations that whales visit to forage for food.

pasta• 8 years ago

Eh, no. They did not discover that mining sites are being placed in deep locations. They discovered that whales visit those locations because they dive deeper than thought.

So maybe: "Deep diving whales may cause licensing issues for prospective mining sites".

spraak• 8 years ago

Eager to cash in, companies have begun the process of sending machinery down to the bottom of the sea to set up mining operations.

What regulatory body would or does oversee that? That makes me really sad... so much of the earth destroyed, and now one of the last (if not the last?) untouched part of nature.

garmaine• 8 years ago

https://www.isa.org.jm

lentil_soup• 8 years ago

Makes me very sad as well, the sea is probably one of the last places where humans haven't destroyed the local mega-fauna

danparsonson• 8 years ago

We're working on that though - many different species of pelagics are threatened by human activity :-/

fabricexpert• 8 years ago

I understand the need to preserve - but what's the point of preserving an environment we'll never, ever see, touch or notice? If the trade off is that we slow economic growth and human prosperity, I'm not sure I'd take it. Of course if there are serious impacts (e.g. climate change or mass extinction of species) then we need to tread carefully.

nerdponx2• 8 years ago

The idea that an air-breathing animal can free dive to 4000 m is astounding. How long would it take a whale to even get down that far? How do they handle the enormous pressure, and change thereof?

delbel4• 8 years ago

I'm sorry, is that even possible?

Khaine• 8 years ago

"Elusive Whales Set New Record for Depth and Length of Dives Among Mammals. A new study of elusive Cuvier's beaked whales shows they can dive to nearly 10,000 feet (3,000 meters)." [1]

[1] https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/03/140326-cuvi...

nerdponx2• 8 years ago

I don't know why you're being downvoted, but that's part of why I posted what I posted.

pvaldes3• 8 years ago

Beaked whales are a really special type of animal. Can hold their breath typically for more than one hour, and even more than 2 hours if needed, and can dive 7Km underwater without breathing.

TomMckenny• 8 years ago

It'd be ironic if those sea floor nodules have value now. "Mining" them has an extremely interesting cold-war story.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Azorian#Building_Gloma...

mrfusion2• 8 years ago

Do we really have the technology to mine the deep sea floor? How would that work?

We had so much trouble just shutting off the deep horizon well that I figured any deep underwater operation is beyond our capacity.

mrfusion2• 8 years ago

Why do they need a license for mining if this is in international waters? Who issues the license?

detaro• 8 years ago

Because international waters aren't a free-for-all zone, and subject to various treaties/UN conventions. The International Seabed Authority.

Depression marks on seafloor suggest whales visiting prospective mining sites

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