AFP, PUERTO MORELOS, Mexico
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A small skiff moves through a stinking carpet of sargassum, dragging what looks like a threshing machine through the brown, floating seaweed choking the normally clear waters of the Mexican Caribbean.A round-the-clock defense is underway against the invasion in Mexico’s international tourism hub, including boats, barriers and manual beach cleaning teams, although officials are still downplaying the impact.An Agence France-Presse team traveled through the Riviera Maya and Tulum aboard one of the 27 specialized ships the Mexican Navy has used since 2019 to contain the proliferation of sargassum — a type of algae with tiny berry-like sacs allowing it to float — that started arriving in 2011.
Members of the Mexican Navy remove sargassum seaweed from a beach in Playa del Carmen, Mexico, on Thursday.
The boat moves as if through a video game, searching for concentrations of the weeds to suck up. A ramp built into the prow uses a mechanical belt to scoop the sargassum off the surface of the water, bringing it into a chute inside the boat. Efforts to scoop up sargassum are carried out on the high seas with a ship that can carry 300 tonnes of the seaweed, as well as smaller boats and amphibious vehicles. The final tactic entails gathering the brown algae by hand.
