KARWAR: In a rare phenomenon, a lot of sand has been deposited on the Karwar shore at beach, catching the attention of marine biologists, who suspect it is a result of climate change.“The sea seems to be behaving in a surprising manner, as the wind speed in the last two days has been very low. Considering that Karwar is surrounded by islands, it had a low reading of tides and the wind. But what is surprising is the deposit of sand on the shore, where the seawater appears to have receded over the days,” said Prakash Mesta, a well-known marine biologist here. He said the deposit of sand in certain quantities has occurred at Rabindranath Tagore Beach earlier too. But by then, the tide would be minus 1 or minus 2.
“However, the wind velocity on Monday was 5 km per hour and the low tide measured up to 0.64 meters, which is not a big reason for the deposit of sand. The tide measured up to 0.55 meter of Tuesday,” he said.
“It could be part of the global warming phenomenon, which could lead to the receding of water and deposit of sand,” said Mesta.
He pointed out that flooding of the river due to torrential rain in 2019 had brought in huge amount of silt. “When something is disposed off into the sea, the latter will retain what it wants and throws out whatever is unwanted,” he added, pointing out how even the waste or dredging material disposed of in the sea was found on the coast.
“The river flooding brought in a huge amount of silt, which settled down, and the sand particles — which is a purified form of the silt -- was thrown out on the beach,” he explained. Waves play a pivotal role in dumping sand onto the shore, Mesta said.
Shivakumar Haragi, assistant professor, Department of Marine Biology, Karnatak University, Dharwad (KUD), said that a proper study is needed to know more about it. Prof Haragi was not sure whether it was a climatic change or man-made, as there have been a few incidents of dredging in some places around Karwar.