Ship traffic connects Antarctica's fragile coasts to worldwide ecosystems.
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Authors
McCarthy, Arlie H
Peck, Lloyd S
Aldridge, David C
Publication Date
2022-01-18Journal Title
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of USA
ISSN
0027-8424
Publisher
National Academy of Sciences
Volume
119
Issue
3
Language
eng
Type
Article
This Version
VoR
Metadata
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McCarthy, A. H., Peck, L. S., & Aldridge, D. C. (2022). Ship traffic connects Antarctica's fragile coasts to worldwide ecosystems.. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of USA, 119 (3) https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2110303118
Abstract
Antarctica, an isolated and long considered pristine wilderness, is becoming increasingly exposed to the negative effects of ship-borne human activity, and especially the introduction of invasive species. Here, we provide a comprehensive quantitative analysis of ship movements into Antarctic waters and a spatially explicit assessment of introduction risk for nonnative marine species in all Antarctic waters. We show that vessels traverse Antarctica's isolating natural barriers, connecting it directly via an extensive network of ship activity to all global regions, especially South Atlantic and European ports. Ship visits are more than seven times higher to the Antarctic Peninsula (especially east of Anvers Island) and the South Shetland Islands than elsewhere around Antarctica, together accounting for 88% of visits to Southern Ocean ecoregions. Contrary to expectations, we show that while the five recognized "Antarctic Gateway cities" are important last ports of call, especially for research and tourism vessels, an additional 53 ports had vessels directly departing to Antarctica from 2014 to 2018. We identify ports outside Antarctica where biosecurity interventions could be most effectively implemented and the most vulnerable Antarctic locations where monitoring programs for high-risk invaders should be established.
Keywords
Biofouling, Anthropogenic Impacts, Marine Conservation, Traffic Networks
Sponsorship
RCUK | NERC | British Antarctic Survey (Core Funding)
Identifiers
35012982, PMC8784123
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2110303118
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/333957
Rights
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
Licence URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
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