Pacific Ocean

Chile has designated the world’s largest marine park — at 740,000 square kilometers, or about the size of the entire nation of Chile. Known as Rapa Nui, the park will safeguard at least 142 endemic marine species, including 27 facing extinction.

The Honolulu-based Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council is in the midst of a debate about changing the rules governing non-commercial fishing in the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument since the monument’s size was quadrupled by the Obama administration.

The United Nations’ UNESCO committee has voted to not add the Great Barrier Reef to its “in danger” list, despite the biggest die-off of coral ever at the World Heritage Site. "We're taking every action possible to ensure this great wonder of the world stays viable and healthy for future generations to come,” Australia's Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg told Australian Broadcasting Corporation Radio.

Although Japan, South Korea, China, the United States and other countries agreed in 2013 to catch less big-eye tuna in the Western and Central Pacific Ocean, U.S. long-line fishermen are raising their catch quotas through side agreements with Pacific island territories, says Civil Beat. Many …

Algae blooms are poisoning marine life farther north than they ever have, says a new study by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The West coast summer sardine population is expected to fall 93 percent from to its 2007 peak, according to the National Marine Fisheries Service.

Gov Jerry Brown signed a law that bans commercial production of genetically engineered salmon in California waters, says the Santa Rosa Press Democrat. The state already barred spawning, incubation, or cultivation of transgenic salmon in the Pacific Ocean.

The National Weather Service sees an increased likelihood of an El Nino weather pattern developing by this summer and through the rest of the year.