[Coral-List] SCTLD in ballast water

Thu Aug 11 16:01:19 UTC 2022

Dear Dr. Miller

Thank you very much for your response and thoughtful comments. I appreciate your call for caution.

My intention is to bring to our attention the need to have a forensic perspective in our approaches when asking questions about causes of diseases, and others. I am not an expert at all in this issue, but I have been in the region and had the great opportunity to experience a living healthy reef in the 80's, and also long enough to see how we concentrate in few causes and do not address some more controversial perspectives. Some might be very difficult to publish. 

I do agree that if we do not make the distinction between working hypothesis and explanatory narratives we can create problems. However, I do think we cannot stop asking ourselves about all possible related events that can be involved in a problem of this dimension, that goes beyond the Keys, and its causes.

We have background information that we can use to establish working hypothesis and if tested properly we can at least have some information to avoid even larger impacts from our human need of expansion. 

Dr. Miller, may I ask why you are certain that there is no link at all between SCTLD with the Miami dredge project? Please take this question from a scientific-hypothesis driven perspective.  I really would like to know that there is not link in there. 

" To my knowledge, nothing conclusive exists that ties SCTLD to ballast water or the Miami dredge project. Testable hypothesis could be framed related to ballast water. I'm not sure the same can be said related to SCTLD and the dredge project. After all, the Miami sewage outfall is in close proximity to the dredge site and outflow from the Miami River is through the dredge channel. Both contain a thick stew of anthropogenic bacteria and viruses and who knows what else."

I agree 100% we do not have any conclusive study to link SCLTD to the above mentioned events. Do we have other certain and clear links that can help the community understand the process?

I agree also 100% on the use of the precautionary principle. If we already know that the Miami Port is localized in close proximity to polluted outflows such as Miami River, is it wise to support, or well, not oppose or at least ask the potential harm a dredging activity can cause? We do not have, in my knowledge, data about what is accumulated in the sediments close to all the canals, and Miami River. Science will never bring the 100% certainty, nature and interconnectivity of events is incredible complicated, however, we can get closer to one and more potential causes of problems, we do not need to eliminate, with the same lack of evidence potential stressor. 

I do not want to make this conversation too long.  Thanks for the call for caution, I do still think we need to have multi-causal perspectives and a forensic approach, complex yes, important yes. 

I hope you have all access to this web site, interesting spread from 2014..... just that site can open minds to many working hypothesis, what background we will use to decide to eliminate some and think others are workable?  Our challenge as scientists in a rapid changing world and limited resources are huge. 

https://floridakeys.noaa.gov/coral-disease/disease.html

Thank you all for your input, I hope you read this with the same intention is expressed. 

Best

Ligia Collado Vides
Teaching Professor
Marine Macroalgae Research lab
Florida International University
Miami, USA

-----Original Message-----
From: Coral-List <coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> On Behalf Of Steven L Miller via Coral-List
Sent: Monday, August 8, 2022 3:38 PM
To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
Subject: Re: [Coral-List] SCTLD in ballast water

Dear Dr. Collado-Vides

I am a long-time fan of Shifting Baselines, which your first point addresses. Our views are shaped by slow motion change and forgotten history. But to your second point, if you are suggesting that the Miami dredge project has something to do with SCTLD, then you are mistaken. 
While you acknowledge "no proof of anything," I'm concerned that many on this List will infer a link between the dredge project and SCTLD based only on your links to decade-old newspaper stories.

To my knowledge, nothing conclusive exists that ties SCTLD to ballast water or the Miami dredge project. Testable hypothesis could be framed related to ballast water. I'm not sure the same can be said related to SCTLD and the dredge project. After all, the Miami sewage outfall is in close proximity to the dredge site and outflow from the Miami River is through the dredge channel. Both contain a thick stew of anthropogenic bacteria and viruses and who knows what else.

This thread was started when the precautionary principle was cited as a reason to address ballast water and SCTLD. That is, act based on the idea of not doing possible harm instead of having to first prove damage. 
In this case, while it'snot harmful to suggest (hypothesize) such a linkage to dredging, without context and facts (and testing) a false narrative can easily arise.

I apologize if I misunderstood and you weren't suggesting a link between dredging and SCTLD.

Sincerely,

Steven Miller, PhD

Senior Scientist

Nova Southeastern University

On 8/5/22 6:29 PM, Ligia Collado-Vides via Coral-List wrote:
> Hi all,
> We have no proof of anything, published papers can wait for many years, or never publish because we do not have the people at the right time. We need more forensic perspectives in the way we address the environmental problems.
>
> However memory is also something we lose very rapidly, Dredging for the huge enlargement of the Port of Miami 2018-2019, spread to the lower Keys, Caribbean.... years after....
>
> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://maritime-executive.com/article/con
> struction-begins-at-portmiami-on-u-s-s-largest-cruise-terminal__;!!Fju
> HKAHQs5udqho!N_1stqx5lewtX-UoBuBLGnpAo46b6Ox4TThg6BpwWNUKb2d0SG2oRZyZc
> IsyA7laWQHZxpCQow6HzvJo0A$
>
>
> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://maritime-executive.com/article/construction-begins-at-portmiami-on-u-s-s-largest-cruise-terminal__;!!FjuHKAHQs5udqho!KV_SnyTil-umd_TTEZ-mnp55wd_y9xV0o4VTcTnst1NGwv_sONSLXMXhSJKDtnLwM9QtMI69_2AvZWedzzyTRN1-BDScQQ$  
>   	Construction Begins at PortMiami on U.S.’s Largest Cruise Terminal
>
>
> U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Takes a Prominent Role at RIMPAC. Published Aug 2, 2022 9:44 PM by The Maritime Executive This year's Rim of the Pacific naval exercise has received considerable attention ...
> maritime-executive.com
>
> Draconic events need to be documented, we tend to totally forget traumatic events, and of course request accountability...
>
> Best
> Ligia
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Coral-List<coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>  On Behalf Of 
> Eugene Shinn via Coral-List
> Sent: Saturday, July 30, 2022 3:46 PM
> To:coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> Subject: [Coral-List] SCTLD in ballast water
>
> Note: This message originated from outside the FIU Faculty/Staff email system.
>
>
> I scanned the interesting research paper that blames coral disease is spread by ships ballast water. It is a reasonable hypothesis. However, I agree with Alina Szmant. I too have not seen the proof. She pointed out that the paper was not peer reviewed. The first thing I noticed in the papers title were the words, “simulated ballast water.” If I were a shipping company owner and that study was being used as proof my ballast water was the major spreader and cause of coral reef demise I would surely have my high paid lawyers go on the attack. They could quickly point out that the study of simulated ballast water does not prove my ballast water causes disease. That otherwise excellent study made me wonder why did the authors not sample water from actual ship ballast tanks? Why use simulated ballast water? At the same time I have to agree there is no evidence that real ballast water is not a carrier of coral disease. Ballast water may actually be spreading coral toxins from reef to reef. However, the real question is If there are disease organisms in ballast water, where did they come from in the first place. Clearly once these agents are in the water column they can easily be moved along with water currents. They do need ballast water for transport. The major current flow directions in the Caribbean are well known and the strongest of these currents flow past the Belize and Florida Keys reefs.
>
> As many list readers know I have been advocating since the 1980s that disease agents in the Caribbean were originally brought to the western Atlantic/Caribbean in dust clouds transported by the Tradewinds. Dust particles carrying disease causing agents are constantly dropping out as the dust clouds move along. Many even cross over into the Pacific. Once corals and other organisms including /Diadema/ and Seafan diseases become established they are easily transmitted down current to affect other marine organisms. I have often suggested the demise of the staghorn fields at San Salvador in 1983, was a starting point for such transport.
>
> Back when my USGS dust study team was active in the late 1990s they 
> cultured and identified around 200 microbes and fungi that were being 
> transmitted in African dust clouds. At the time we knew asthma was 
> rampant in children on those windward islands in the Bahamas. Even 
> Puerto Rico is well known for its respiratory diseases. In those days 
> it baffled me why so many competent scientists rejected the dust 
> hypothesis. Later as I matured I realized it was all about politics 
> and funding. I suppose blaming coral diseases on ballast water these 
> days is politically correct. Gene 
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