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CNN Live Today

Thousands of Animals Dead From Toxic Algae

Aired May 09, 2002 - 14:54   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: There is something in the water off the coast of California. It's killing not only ocean life, but birds as well. Tony Russomanno of our affiliate, KPIX now, with that story on the West Coast.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TONY RUSSOMANNO, KPIX REPORTER: Tens of thousands of California sea lions, dolphins and birds are sick or dying from one of the worst toxic algae poisonings in recorded state history.

MARY SILVER, UNIV. OF CALIFORNIA, SANTA CRUZ: The levels compete with the highest levels ever found in California.

RUSSOMANNO: The marine mammal center in Sausalito is overwhelmed with dozens of critically ill sea lions rescued from beaches in San Luis Obisbo, Santa Barbara and Los Angeles counties.

KATHY ZAGZEBSKI, MARINE MAMMAL CENTER: I was seeing a lot of neurological symptoms, including seizuring on the beach, head waving, head bobbing, and just being oblivious to people and other entities around them.

RUSSOMANNO: The culprit is Pseudonitzschia, a single-cell plant about the width of a human hair. Marine researchers at UC Santa Cruz are tracking the plant. Under certain conditions it produces a deadly nerve toxic. But it doesn't cause a problem until it moves up the food chain.

SILVER: So when the schools of anchovies and sardines, the bait fish, come in, that's when times get really dangerous.

RUSSOMANNO: The toxin can be deadly to people if infected fish or shellfish are eaten in large quantities. UC Santa Cruz professor of ocean science, Dr. Mary Silver, identified the poison from water samples in Santa Barbara.

SILVER: As I was collecting my samples, a sea lion was seizuring on the beach. And as I walked off the pier, the Marine Mammal Center people came to rescue it.

RUSSOMANNO: The plankton is the same one that killed more than 400 sea lions in Monterey Bay in 1998. It also caused hundreds of sea birds in crazed death rows to attack people in Santa Cruz in 1961, and became the inspiration for Alfred Hitchcock's movie, "The Birds." Hitchcock was living near Santa Cruz at the time.

There is some evidence that current southern California algae outbreak is spreading into Monterey Bay.

SILVER: My guess would be that those species are coming northward. We're seeing nontoxic forms in the water now. Whether they'll change species to the toxic forms, we simply don't know.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HEMMER: Tony Russomanno, KPIX, again, from California.

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