A world of sound lies beneath the ocean’s surface.
New research led by MBARI found a reduction in noise from shipping traffic during the COVID-19 pandemic. By leveraging audio recorded by an underwater microphone on MBARI’s MARS cabled observatory, the research team found significantly reduced low-frequency noise between January and June 2020. Compared to data recorded for that same period in 2018 and 2019, ocean noise was reduced by half. Analyzing data from government agencies revealed this reduction in low-frequency noise occurred alongside unusually low maritime shipping activity across the state during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The sound of global trade is in the ocean, and that sound is noise. Ocean noise levels responded very quickly to economic impacts of the pandemic,” said John Ryan, a biological oceanographer at MBARI and lead author of the study published this week in Frontiers in Marine Science. Learn more on our website.
