A giant swarm of blue jellyfish has invaded the pristine waters of the Gold Coast
Spotted just off Narrowneck, near the northern end of Surfer's Paradise beach, the school of jellyfish extended for 50 metres in circumference.
Photographer and lifesaver Grahame Long captured footage of the blue jellyfish as he patrolled the beach, about 400 metres offshore.
"I've seen plenty of jellyfish around before but this was certainly the thickest I've ever seen, Mr Long told The Gold Coast Bulletin.
'They were congregated in one area.'
Local residents have reported sightings of the jellyfish for several weeks, after the swarm blew in just after Christmas.
One Twitter user labelled it a 'jellyfish explosion', while others found the idea of the swarm either 'terrifying' or 'incredible'.
Local media issued warnings for the correct treatment if swimmers were stung, urging locals to avoid vinegar and urine.
'The protocol for non-serious cases is to seek assistance from lifeguards and treat the sting with warm water until the swelling goes down, then with ice,' said Gold Coast paramedic Gary Strong.
'We do not tell people to use boiling water as the last thing we want to create is a burn,' he told The Gold Coast Bulletin.
The mass has spread out in the past day, extending from Surfer's Paradise to the Gold Coast Seaway, with some locals still concerned about being prevented from swimming in the water.
The weather will reportedly maintain its heat over the weekend, reaching up to 32 degrees.
Local media issued warnings for the correct treatment for stings, urging locals to avoid vinegar and urine
I saw huge amounts of these jellyfish on New Years Eve when I took the car ferry to the Moreton Bay Islands. This is the bay immediately to the east of Brisbane area for those unfamiliar with the area. The car ferry is fairly slow moving, so you can check out the water if you want to. At that time they were about 1/3 as thick as in the picture provided, but were everywhere I looked as we travelled along. I finally quit looking for them because they were everywhere. Moreton Bay is a pretty big body of water, running from well North of Brisbane, and down into the region of the Gold Coast.
I had never noticed them before on any trips in the bay.
Now this article is dated 17 days after I saw them, and the Bay kind of bottlenecks down in the Surfers Paradise area; so maybe the wind and currents have funnelled all that I saw on New Years Day, into the region?
If not, there are TONS more on the way, as the whole bay was infested with them. I even wondered if they would clog up the engine coolant pipes of the ferry. I enquired at work about these, and was told, yes they can give you a pretty bad sting.
I read an article recently on how the worlds oceans were becoming the perfect environment for jellyfish to explode in numbers.
This was due to pollution, Fukushima, and loss of jellyfish predators, etc.
We might need to get used to sights like this in the future, and of course, that kills the "lets go swimming" idea pretty quickly.
This is bad for the tourist biz, as it is these beaches and the surf which bring so many to holiday in the area. Big financial hit for the Gold Coast is brewing, or swimming offshore.
Pravdaseeker