Over the past several months, you might have seen a health alert issued for your local beach for red tide.
Red tide has been blooming off our coastline for nearly four months now, but we haven’t seen those major impacts one typically associates with the blooms.
Fox 4 Meteorologist Andrew Shipley went to find out the answers about what is going on off our coastline and if we should be concerned in the months ahead.
WATCH HIS REPORT BELOW:
Cold fronts keeping red tide offshore for now
“We are seeing it rise in severity, then bumping back down,” said Capt. Codty Pierce, the Calusa Waterkeeper.
Despite loitering off coastline, red tide hasn’t truly shown its ugly head…at least not yet. Pierce says consistent cold fronts are a major reason why.
“It has absolutely saved our butt,” said Pierce. “Today, we are out here, day two I think after the cold front. We have a strong northeast breeze. All of this is helping keep any bit of aerosolized offshore.”
But when winds have turned to out of the southwest winds, we have seen health alerts issued by local health departments.