For months on end, beach-goers in Florida have been checking the local alerts for conditions related to the red tide event happening off the coast. The conditions are listed on different sites from different counties and towns but the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission released a new map that makes it easier for those in the area to keep up with the latest levels of the harmful algae cells.
The new interactive map shows the concentration of the algae causing the red tide in different areas up and down the coast of Florida. The algae's presence is measured in cells per liter and it ranges in different areas from not present to high concentrations.
Where the concentrations are high, the beaches are usually closed. Thursday some beaches in Miami-Dade County north of Haulover Park were closed due to the concentration of the algae.
When a map user selects a spot on the map, based on its color they can tell how high the concentration of the cells is. Users can also zoom in to see the latitude and longitude where that sample was taken from and the areas around it where other samples were taken.
The red tide is actually an algae bloom that can cause toxic conditions in the waters and in the air above the water. When there's a higher than normal concentration of the algae in the ocean the red tide occurs, this particular tide is caused by the algae Karenia brevis.
When the concentrations of it are high enough, the water can look like it's red or brown and it can actually kill off animals that live in the water. The algae can produce toxins that impact the central nervous systems of the marine life. The waves can also break the algae up so that those toxins also get released into the air where they cause respiratory problems for humans.
People with existing respiratory issues, like asthma, should avoid swimming in red tide waters and should avoid the shoreline along those waters. The toxins can also cause an itchy throat, cough, a runny nose and red watery eyes in some people.
Officials are unsure how long the bloom will last and how long the red tide will impact the shores and waters of Florida. It's been months of an intense red tide that originally began about a month ago.
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Nina was a breaking news reporter. She previously worked at Business Insider, The Boston Globe, and Boston.com.
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