The heat wave killed millions. So the river Darling-Baaka in the Australian state of New South Wales a few hours ago appeared as a huge fish graveyard: entire schools dead after the high temperatures that hit the region in recent days. “L’heat wave it added further stress on a river system it had already undergone extreme shocks due to recent major floods,” he explained on Facebook the State Department of Primary Industries. “These fish deaths are linked to low oxygen levels in the water (hypoxia). The current warm weather in the region is also exacerbating thehypoxia, as warmer water holds less oxygen than cold water, and fish need more oxygen at warmer temperatures. Images of the Darling-Baaka River show a long dead fish school several kilometers, which is now beginning to rot. The number is so high that the authorities believe it is impossible to remove them.
Approximately 500 people live in the city of Menindee who are currently distressed by what they found in the river, part of the Murray Darling reservoir, the largest river system of Australia. In the Facebook post, the DPI also explained how the people of the city rely on the river for their water supplies: “They use the river water for washing and showering, now they won’t be able to access that water for domestic use, is that is simply shameful». A few hours ago the temperature in Menindee reached i 41 °C. That same area of the river is not new to ecological disasters like the one that happened a few hours ago: a very similar event occurred in the summer of 2018. The group of researchers who at the time had been tasked with understanding its causes now reaffirm the strong role of climate change in New South Wales: «The transition from floods to drought and then back to the floods it happens more quickly than ever.
For years, the governments of the area have been working on a program that should help improve the health of the river: among the solutions there is also a limit on the amount of water that companies and local administrations in the region can withdraw. But the implementation of the plan has proved to be much more complex than expected since 2008, given the difficulty of the parties involved in finding a compromise. Meanwhile the river has just become a fish graveyard again: «Imagine the smell of a dead fish left to rot for a few days in a sink and multiply that smell by millions of fish,” explained a resident at the Guardian. “This is the largest fish kill since 2018,” commented the local reporter Sarah McConnell spreading the sad images on Twitter.
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