Watch: A million sea animals crossed the Pacific, washed up on US coast after 2011 Japan tsunami
The creatures made the 4,800-mile journey moving on chunks of the debris.
In the “longest maritime migration” ever recorded, nearly 300 species of sea creatures have crossed the Pacific Ocean and washed up on the United States’ west coast since the tsunami that hit Japan in 2011, a study published on Friday showed.
An estimated 1 million creatures made the near 4,800-mile journey, moving in the sea on chunks of tsunami debris, according to the study published in Science magazine.
The species include crustaceans, sea slugs and sea worms.
“This has turned out to be one of the biggest unplanned natural experiments in marine biology – perhaps in history,” one of the authors of the study was quoted as saying by The Guardian.
The 2011 tsunami in North East Japan, triggered by an earthquake of magnitude 9, generated 5 million tonnes of debris.
Between June 2012 and February this year, 289 Japanese species attached to 600 pieces of debris washed up on the beaches of Washington, Oregon, California, Alaska and Hawaii in the US and in British Columbia in Canada, the study found.
Some even reproduced as they moved eastward.
Other interesting Japanese objects that washed up on the other side of the Pacific after the tsunami include a football, which reached Alaska, and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, which reached Canada.