Seaweed assaults Galveston beaches Beach cleanup begins as mounds of stinky Sargassum threaten to turn off tourists

A Galveston Park Board worker moves mounds of Sargassum several feet high in places in Galveston near Seawall Boulevard. A Galveston Park Board worker moves mounds of Sargassum several feet high in places in Galveston near Seawall Boulevard. Photo: Billy Smith II, Staff Photo: Billy Smith II, Staff Image 1 of / 11 Caption Close Seaweed assaults Galveston beaches 1 / 11 Back to Gallery

GALVESTON - A cold front gave Galveston Island temporary respite Wednesday from a relentless three-day onslaught of seaweed that piled up on beaches at a rate not seen in years, leaving mounds of Sargassum several feet high in places.

"These landings are pretty big," said Kelly de Schaun, Galveston Park Board executive director. "This is probably the worst case of seaweed we've seen in at least the last five years."

The cold front pushed the seaweed back out to sea, but it is expected to return with a vengeance in a couple of days, said Robert Webster, marine science research assistant at Texas A&M University at Galveston. Webster said the Sargassum is continuing to grow in nutrient-rich waters offshore and will resume its march to shore when the cold front passes. He predicted another week to 10 days of Sargassum.

The unusually large mass of seaweed accumulation forced the Park Board to temporarily abandon its policy of leaving seaweed where it washes ashore to trap sand and help fight wave erosion that shrinks beaches.

All available Park Board employees have been pressed into service, some recalled from vacation, to keep the seaweed from interfering with tourism, the island's lifeblood, de Schaun said. Employees and heavy equipment are at work every morning before dawn to make sure that arriving tourists are not blocked from the surf by a wall of seaweed.

The onslaught of seaweed forced the Park Board to use front-end loaders even though their use had been halted earlier because they scooped up too much precious beach sand. Workers are also using surf rakes, which rake the seaweed onto a conveyor belt without scooping up sand. The massive accumulations are being moved to growing piles of seaweed at the back of the beaches.

"Sunday was the worst," said Sharon Mamich, 43, of Houston, who was taking advantage of the seaweed reprieve Wednesday and relaxing on East Beach. "I was on the seawall and it stunk." She said the smell was especially repugnant to a friend and her 6-year-old daughter. "It just grossed them out."

Holli Vivrine, 25, of Beaumont also found the seaweed disagreeable, as she sat with friends in front of the seawall near the Galveston Pleasure Pier. "It just smells and it's itchy if you walk on it," Vivrine said.

The seaweed is arriving on Galveston beaches after drifting for thousands of miles from the Sargasso Sea, the only sea on the planet without land borders. The Sargasso Sea is at the intersection of four ocean currents known as the Northern Atlantic Subtropical Gyre. The Gulf Stream forms the western boundary of the Sargasso Sea, the North Atlantic Current the northern, the Canary Current the eastern, and the North Atlantic Equatorial Current the southern.

Sargassum seaweed is an algae that grows in the Sargasso Sea and eventually drifts into the Gulf of Mexico, growing as it makes its journey. The currents return much of the seaweed to the Sargasso Sea, but some drifts into the nutrient-filled waters off the Texas Coast where it thrives.

"The Texas coastline is like a nursery for Sargassum," Webster said.

The recent series of cold fronts combined with currents to form ideal conditions for keeping the seaweed from drifting ashore as it normally would and instead continuing to flourish in the Gulf. Webster estimated it grew by more than 30 percent. Finally a break in the weather allowed the immense collection of seaweed to drift ashore.

Webster has researched newspaper reports of seaweed landings for the last century and found that extraordinarily large events occur about every 30 years. The last major surge of seaweed came in the early 2000s. "A specific weather event can alter those cycles," Webster said. The recent series of cold fronts was such an event.

Webster developed the Sargassum Early Advisory System, which uses satellites to warn Galveston officials of the coming seaweed. "There was such a huge volume out there it didn't take a whole lot to tell you we were going to get killed," Webster said.

Jesse Ojeda, operations manager for the Park Board beach cleaning department, stood on the seawall near the 61st Street Pier and watched a front-end loader tackle an immense, two-block long pile of seaweed that until Wednesday could not be moved because of high tides. "Everybody says this is the worst they've seen in a long time," he said.

The hope is that the influx of Sargassum will dissipate before the summer beach crowds arrive.

"We are hopeful," de Schaun said, that "this slew we're getting now is the worst we are going to see of it."

Despite her distaste for seaweed, Mamich continues to have an appetite for Galveston. "You can't beat it for a vacation," she said.