Date Published: 21/04/2020
ARCHIVED - Mar Menor: another research group analyses Gota Fria effect on the lagoon
ARCHIVED ARTICLE
Researchers investigate the relationship between gota fría storms and the problems in the Mar Menor
A research group consisting of experts from universities in Murcia, Valencia and Sevilla has been formed to analyse the effect of changing weather patterns on the marine environment of the Mar Menor, according to the regional government of Murcia, with particular reference to the increased frequency of “DANAs” (isolated high altitude depressions) in south-eastern Spain and the torrential “gota fría” storms with which these phenomena are often associated.
The aim of the study, according to Antonio Luengo (the minister for Water, Agriculture and the Environment in the Murcia government), is to understand better how the rain which has run off into the Mar Menor over the last 30 years has affected the lagoon, as well as to analyse the effect of there being more cloudbursts than in the past on the huge aquifer which lies beneath the farmland of the Campo de Cartagena. Sr Luengo adds that episodes of torrential rain are now 6 times more frequent than they were in 1990, and that this is having “devastating effects on the ecosystem”.
(Click here for a summary of the factors contributing to the changes in the marine environment of the Mar Menor over the last 50 years.)
Despite the general consensus that the main factor behind the alteration in water quality in the Mar Menor over recent decades is the use of fertilizers in agriculture in the Campo de Cartagena, a practice which increases the nutrient content of runoff water into the lagoon, Sr Luengo and the Murcia government maintain that the importance of the rash of heavy storms in recent years must not be underestimated. The latest downpour in many parts of Murcia as recently as Sunday was no more than a minor incident in comparison with the four far more severe storms which have hit the Region since September of last year, the first of which has been described as the worst storm in the last 50 years, but in spite of all the rhetoric, stormwater once again ran into the Mar Menor on Sunday carrying silt, and, it is alleged, sewage, into the lagoon.
This has led to the amount of water in the reservoirs in the Segura basin having reached 45 per cent of capacity, a figure not seen since 2013 and an increase of around 50 per cent over the level of a year ago.
Antonio Luengo also reiterated on Monday that the Murcia government is currently applying at least 15 measures to protect the Mar Menor, but that they will take effect over the “medium to long term” rather than immediately. Once again he asserted that the responsibility for short-term measures lies with the Department of the Environment in the national government, such as the pumping of water out of the aquifer and the Rambla del Albujón, one of the natural runoff water channels which leads into the Mar Menor.
The regional government has been immersed in arguments with the CHS (the body managing the water infrastructure in the region) and the national government over who is responsible for paying for the necessary measures ever since the algal bloom three years ago and last week these arguments continued. Click to read this article
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