Piney Point Update: Catastrophic Red Tide in Tampa Bay – Water Quality Testing using StellarNet UV-VIS Spectrometers

The beaches and waterways along the Florida coast are currently being affected by a catastrophic Red Tide outbreak of unprecedented proportions. This is just months after one of the largest state-sanctioned wastewater dumps at the Piney Point reservoir spilled millions of gallons of contaminated phosphate runoff into the once pristine coastal waterways. For the past two weeks, beachgoers witnessed rotting fish carcasses as far as the eye could see. Over 800 tons of dead fish and sea life have washed ashore. The putrid stench of piles rotting carcasses, a soup of reddish-brown ocean, and the coughing, sneezing, and teary eyes caused by Brevetoxin (cyclic polyether compounds produced naturally by a species of dinoflagellate known as Karenia brevis), forced most people to leave in horror. Over 200 million gallons of polluted water was dumped into the bay between late March and early April. And now we local residents, businesses, tourists, and innocent sea life have to deal with the aftermath. 

On April 15, The StellarNet Team independently tested the polluted water and reported that the area around Piney Point measured 2–6 times more phosphate than other parts of the bay!

Piney Point on-site Water Quality Testing using StellarNet UV-VIS Spectrometers.

“Linking this year’s horrific Red Tide directly with a human and state-sanctioned pollution event is not at all challenging for me,” says StellarNet President, Jason Pierce. “The facts are simple: People were allowed to dump polluted water into the bay.  Our team then went out and independently tested the polluted waters using our portable spectrometer technology and found 2-6 times elevated phosphate levels around the spill.  We know that Red Tide algae feed on nutrients including phosphate. Now, within months we are experiencing this catastrophic Red Tide.  You don’t need to be a scientist to link these events.”

Many local researchers have shared their take on the Piney Point Natural Disaster:

“Even though the bloom already existed before the spill, the extra nutrients from the Piney Point spill created a cascading situation that rapidly became worse and boosted the algal bloom. Robert Weisberg, a distinguished professor of Physical Oceanography at the University of South Florida, told local news stations he believed Piney Point discharges could be fueling that same bloom and making matters worse. “I don’t think it would’ve taken off to the levels that we’re seeing without Piney Point,” Weisberg explained.

Unfortunately, not all scientists in public leadership roles are willing to openly connect the dots and instead, chose to cautiously face uncertainty.

Tom Frazer, now the dean and a professor at the University of South Florida College of Marine Science says “It’s quite possible that nutrients, recycled nutrients in the system as a result of Piney Point could have contributed to that. But there are a large number of nutrient sources along the coast. And, again, we’ve tried to address a lot of those nutrient sources.” Tom said in a discussion hosted by Governor Desantis.

Again, Jason Pierce, “We used our portable spectrometers and were able to easily test nutrient levels throughout the bay and coastal waters.  Nothing came even close to the nutrient surplus levels found around Piney Point.  Even if the state labs haven’t yet invested in our technology; they can easily take water samples back to their labs and provide analytical data and results. Transparency when it comes to water quality should be easy!” 

Check out the results below and follow StellarNet on Linkedin or Facebook for future updates.

Below is a map from local meteorologist Bryan Bennett. It depicts satellite data that shows the normalized Red Tide fluorescence height.  The excess nutrients that were leaked into our waterways is localized to the area of the spill and therefore can be blamed as a direct cause of this Red Tide outbreak. Notice the dense Red Tide locations with massive fish kills localized around the Piney Point area where StellarNet independently measured phosphate levels 6 times higher than samples taken from the surrounding areas which hadn’t had time to mix with the phosphate runoff. Next, notice the Red Tide’s progression out from Piney Point into the gulf and then across the shoreline.

Karenia brevis is endemic to the Gulf of Mexico. Typically we see these algae blooms later in the summer and early fall. As the bloom grows it affects more of our local beaches. Usually, the impact is short and beachgoers are able to enjoy the natural beauty the Florida coast has to offer.

With the red tide comes the indiscriminate death of many different types of marine life. The Brevetoxin affects humans, fish, stingrays, crustaceans, mollusks, and even sharks, suffocating and paralyzing the organisms. These fish wash up onto the shores of our local beaches. City crews have been working around the clock to clean up the shores.  As the fish decay on the shores, it causes more fish to die due to the water becoming oxygen-deprived. Not only does the Red Tide kill fish – but it also causes respiratory irritation to locals and tourists alike, making it hard to enjoy the sugar soft white sand and natural beauty of our beaches.

Piney Point Water Results – 4/9/21

The StellarNet team collected 12 samples from a variety of different locations surrounding the Piney Point leak as well as 4 reference samples from other parts of Tampa Bay. After collecting the samples, we used phosphate and nitrate test kits from NECi.  These kits use different enzyme-based reagents (non-toxic) to cause either a color change in the sample or a change in the absorbance at a certain wavelength. We did these tests initially on the boat using our zAP2 WiFi-enabled BLUE-Wave spectrometer and our ChemWiz mobile app (available for iPhone and Android). While we did not find increased levels of nitrate, we did; however, find elevated results for phosphate in the area close to the leak. We brought the water samples back to our lab and re-measured the samples with a second batch of reagents to validate our findings. 

Piney Point Water Analysis by Location (mg/L P)