Pathogen may be crab killer

MASS crab deaths on the north east coast may have been caused by a pathogen new to British waters, an independent panel has concluded.

Thousands of crustaceans washed up on the coastline from Hartlepool to Whitby between October and December 2021.

An early investigation by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) concluded that algal blooms were the cause of the incident, but the findings were rejected by scientists and local fishermen.

Academic research backed by the fishing industry suggested the deaths could have been caused by pyridine, an industrial pollutant, that it was feared may have come from dredging in River Tees during maintenance of the port.

But research by a team of 12 experts, led by Defra’s chief scientific adviser, rejected both scenarios. It concluded that pyridine poisoning or dredging were “very unlikely” to be the source, and algal bloom “unlikely”.

The panel concluded that the most likely cause of the deaths was a potential disease or parasite new to UK waters, but said more work would need to be done to reach a more concrete conclusion. They also suggested a combination of factors, including algal bloom, may have contributed to the scale of the deaths.