http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/22/us/pacific-ocean-blob/
(CNN)Marine life seen swimming in unusual places. Water temperatures warmer than they should be. No snow where there should be feet of it.
Some scientists are saying "The Blob" could be playing a factor.
As monikers go, the blob doesn't sound very worrisome.
But if you're a salmon fisherman in Washington or a California resident hoping to see the end of the drought, the blob could become an enemy of top concern.
A University of Washington climate scientist and his associates have been studying the blob -- a huge area of unusually warm water in the Pacific -- for months.
"In the fall of 2013 and early 2014 we started to notice a big, almost circular mass of water that just didn't cool off as much as it usually did, so by spring of 2014 it was warmer than we had ever seen it for that time of year," said Nick Bond, who works at the Joint Institute for the Study of the Atmosphere and Ocean in Seattle, Washington.
Bond, who gave the blob its name, said it was 1,000 miles long, 1,000 miles wide and 100 yards deep in 2014 -- and it has grown this year.
And it's not the only one; there are two others that emerged in 2014, Nate Mantua of the Southwest Fisheries Science Center -- part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) -- said in September. One is in the Bering Sea and the other is off the coast of Southern California.
Waters in the blob have been warmer by about 5.5 degrees, a significant rise.
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