This year’s World Water Day theme was “making the invisible visible”. The reference was to groundwater, but TPSF first webinar focused in another naked-eye invisible water-related element that occasionally becomes very much visible.
Priscila Lange, visiting professor at the Laboratory of Application of Environmental Satellites (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), gave a talk on massive harmful algal blooms that began in October 2021 and are still present in different areas of the Rio de Janeiro coast.
During the talk, Priscila presented potential causes, the distinct bloom types and dominant algae species, timeline of the event and how researchers are following it closely with satellite imagery and field sampling.