How Could an Underwater Highway Help Save Sea Turtles?

highway for sea creatures. This swimway, a major marine animal migration route, spans more than forty six thousand square miles or one hundred and twenty thousand square kilometers between Ecuador's Galapgos Islands and Costa Rica's Cocos Island, both UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Wildlife like sea turtles and numerous other endangered species frequently traverse this roughly four hundred mile route that's about six hundred and fifty kilometers looking for food and nesting.

While while each country protects the waterways around its respective islands, the well trodden passage between the tube is riddled with life threatening risks for marine life, largely linked to overfishing. The underwater highway, first proposed in twenty eighteen, could change that and help model conservation for other important areas around the world. Here's how it works and how it could

benefit our increasingly threatened oceans. Okay, first off, there won't be a literal expressway with turtles and sharks traversing lanes between these two locations, and the marine passage won't require construction or physical guard rails like some of the land based bridges and tunnels that safeguard migratory terrestrial animals around the world. Instead, the Cocos Galapagos Swimway will protect sea life from human driven threats like fishing with a series

of interwoven regulations and oversight. The project will set up no fishing zones linking two existing marine protected areas or MPAs, the Galapagos Marine Reserve, established in nineteen ninety eight and Cocos Island National Park, which has been protected since the nineteen eighties. While animals are already largely safe within those reserves, they face severe threats from commercial fishing, such as net entanglements when they enter open waters. For the article of

this episode is based on how Stuffworks. Spoke via email Tom O'Hara, communications manager for Galapagos Conservation Trust. He said the ocean between Galapagos and Cocos is a popular place for industrial fishing fleets to work, including those focus on harvesting shark fins often destined for the Asian market. In order to fully protect the swimway, new MPAs must be created and implemented. In twenty twenty two, Ecuador made headway

with its new Harmandad Marine Reserve. The reserve added more than twenty three thousand square miles that's sixty thous square kilometers to Ecuadors protected areas of the ocean. A roughly half of that includes a now fishing zone to protect Ecuador's portion of the swimway, and now the initiative relies on Costa Rica expanding its protections. Houstuffworks also spoke with Todd Steiner, executive director of the Turtle Island Restoration Network.

Steiner is a founding member of Mygramar, a collective of scientists studying the movement of Keystone migratory marine species Migramar is spearheading this swimway initiative. A Steiner explained that countries have what's called exclusive economic zones. A quote, every country owns two hundred miles that's three hundred and twenty two kilometers out from its land mass. A Costa Rica owns two hundred miles from its coast, and it also owns

two hundred miles around Cocos Island. A Cocos Island and the Galapagos are three hundred and ninety four miles that's six hundred and thirty four kilometers apart, so the exclusive economic zones just overlap. If you can get these two countries to agree, you can protect a large swath of this important migration corridor to run effectively. This protected swimway requires oversight from the government and scientists in the Galapagos.

This is already in motion, O'Hara said. The Galapagos Marine Reserve is policed by both the Marine Unit of the Galapagos National Park Directorate and by the Ecuadorian Navy. There is also increasing use of technology such as satellites to monitor fishing activity. Various sea creatures frequent this migratory route throughout their life cycles. It sees turtles and sharks, including six endangered species whale sharks, tiger sharks, leatherback turtles, green turtles,

silky sharks, and scalloped hammerhead sharks. Creatures follow this specific route because it's easy to navigate. The islands are the volcanic mountain tops of a long underwater mountain range. Because the range is volcanic, it's also magnetic. Species use this to navigate from point to point. The Swimways Mountain range is packed with biodiversity, providing food for migratory animals along

their journeys. The migrators also flock to the Cocos and Galapagos Islands for nesting and foraging, and many of these species can use all the help they can get. For example, the Galapagos green turtle averages about one hundred eggs per nest, yet only two on average reach the adult stage due to natural predators like crabs and birds. Once these two ish hatchlings reach adulthood and begin to travel, they encounter

even more threats, again like commercial fishing. According to the World Wildlife Fund, or WWF, more than two hundred and fifty thousand turtles around the world die after being caught in fisheries, largely from fishing nets. These are bad odds for the Galapagos green turtle, which is listed as endangered by the WWF. It's even worse news for the leatherback sea turtle, which is on the verge of extinction due

to overfishing pressures. The WWF reports of the Pacific Ocean may have only two thousand, three hundred adult leatherback females remaining. The Cocos Galapagos Swimway was designed to safeguard marine migrators like the sea turtle, but turtles aren't the only animals that would benefit from enhanced protections. After all, everything on

our planet is linked, O'Hara said. Island, coastal and marine ecosystems are all linked, and healthy ocean biodiversity helps terrestrial and coastal species that depend directly or indirectly on the ocean. Carbon dioxide is absorbed and stored by marine ecosystems such as mangroves, and by marine creatures themselves. Protecting the seas around the Galapagos is not just about protecting marine wildlife,

It's about safeguarding the future of our own species. Today's episode is based on the article the Galapagos and Cocos Islands are building a turtle super Highway on how stuffworks dot com, written by Stephanie Vermilion. Brain Stuff is production of iHeartRadio in partnership with HowStuffWorks dot com and is produced by Tyler Klang. For more podcasts from My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.