Death fish

The dead fish started appearing on Saturday afternoon but by Sunday evening, the number of fish has increased alarmingly,” said Keamari Town UC-4 Councilor Abdul Ghani. He added that it was not just dead fish but dead turtles that were being spotted in this area as well.
The mysterious arrival of thousands of dead fish of different sizes into the backwaters of the Karachi harbor, near Baba Island and Bhitt Island, late Saturday night, has created panic among fishermen but the Karachi Port Trust authorities have said they died in the annual Red Tide phenomenon.
Resident of Shamspir village, Suliman, blamed the harbor authorities for allowing deep sea trailers to take all the fish in the open sea, leaving the local fishermen with no choice but to fish on the polluted shores. “We don’t know what to do and how to earn our livelihood in such conditions. Many of us are thinking of changing our profession,” he said.

However, KPT officials rejected the fishermen’s claims that the fish died of toxic chemicals. “This is the work of the Red Tide, locally known as ‘Mara Pani (The killer water).’ It is a normal phenomenon and happens several times a year. There is no need to panic,” said the Karachi Port Trust (KPT) Marine Pollution Control Manager, Muhammad Zahiya Usmani. He also rejected that the fish died in the harbor limits.

“The fish died because of the high tide, outside of the harbor, and then came within the harbor limits with the tide,” said Usmani. Rejecting claims of industrial poisoning, he said that heavy layer of poisonous red algae that forms during a specific period every year, comes to the surface and attracts the fish. When the fish come in contact with the red algae and try to eat it, they die. This happens a lot but this time the high tide has brought the dead fish to the surface,” he said