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When most people gaze out of an airplane window, they admire the fluffy clouds slowly floating past them. But when New England Aquarium Aerial survey observers look out of a plane, they’re scouring the seas for marine animals swimming far below.
And on August 16, the team was rewarded—big time. While soaring over the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, they spotted over 2,000 animals across 15 different marine species. The Atlantic Ocean marine sanctuary 130 miles southeast of Cape Cod was designated in 2016. It includes four underwater mountains and three deep-sea canyons, landmarks where many different animals feed.
“The diversity of sightings was truly remarkable and a testament to why the Monument is such a special habitat,” Katherine McKenna, a researcher at the aquarium’s Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life, said in a statement. “From regular visitors like dolphins and sperm whales, to large baleen whales drawn by aggregations of zooplankton and whale sharks and manta rays following warm Gulf Stream waters, the Monument brings together an incredible variety of marine life.”
Scientists with the Anderson Cabot Center documented 1,800 dolphins, one endangered sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus), a humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae), one endangered fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus) mother with a calf, 11 whale sharks (Rhincodon typus), manta rays (genus Mobula), devil rays (genus Mobula), Chilean devil rays (Mobula tarapacana), and hammerhead sharks (genus Sphyrna). Just beyond the sanctuary, they also recorded an endangered blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus) and a small group of endangered fin whales.
“Seeing a variety of threatened and endangered species actively feeding in the Monument was particularly memorable and underscores the importance of protecting this productive habitat,” McKenna added. The Trump Administration has recently allowed commercial fishing in the Monument.
During the aquarium’s previous aerial survey over the special habitat in July, scientists identified almost 650 animals, including over 600 dolphins, endangered sperm whales, one whale shark, and 23 pilot whales (genus Globicephala). A 2022 study authored mostly by Anderson Cabot Center researchers demonstrated that the habitat sustains a diverse and distinct group of marine mammals.
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