While the outbreak has abated, the disease persists. While there are signs of recovery for some species or local populations, there are entire species and regions that have not recovered. Death of the Sunflower Sea Star Means Ecological Unravelling in the Pacific. Thousands of large sunflower sea stars, top, congregate on a subtidal rock in the Salish Sea, a waterway north of Seattle between the United States an Canada. The disease, called “sea star wasting syndrome” (SSWS) has persisted at low levels in most areas, and continues to kill sea stars. Since 2013, sea star wasting disease has killed massive numbers of multiple sea star species all along the Pacific coast of North America, from Mexico to Alaska. From Mexico to Alaska, sea stars withered and died, their bodies dissolving into mush, leaving nothing but goo and spines behind. The combination of ocean warming and an infectious wasting disease has devastated populations of large sunflower sea stars once abundant along the West Coast of North America, according to research by Cornell University and the University of California, Davis, in Science Advances, Jan. 30. ... corals, and abalone. This unprecedented phenomenon, known as sea star wasting disease (SSWD), ultimately affected more … At the time of the wasting disease outbreak — the cause of which is still unknown, but may be linked to warmer temperatures — many larvae spawned by dying sea stars were still at sea. Since 2013, a sea star wasting disease has affected >20 sea star species from Mexico to Alaska. Prior to the autumn of 2013 (when Sea Star Wasting Disease appeared) the SUNFLOWER STAR was sometimes found in very dense aggregations in Howe Sound, BC, during the winter. Due to sea star wasting disease, a photo of the same rock just weeks later, above, shows the sunflower sea stars have all disappeared. By the end of October, virtually all the SUNFLOWER STARS were dead. Sea stars along much of the North American Pacific coast experienced a massive die-off in 2013/14 due to a mysterious wasting syndrome. The combination of ocean warming and an infectious wasting disease has devastated populations of large sunflower sea stars once abundant along the West Coast of North America, according to research by Cornell University and the University of California, Davis, in Science Advances, Jan. 30. Sunflower sea stars—whose 16 to 24 arms exceed 3 feet long—were once prolific throughout the Salish Sea, which borders Washington state and Canada’s British Columbia. She had heard reports that even captive sea stars in the Vancouver Aquarium were dying. Sunflower sea stars (commonly called starfish) are dying off by the millions on the Pacific Coast from Sea Star Wasting Disease. THE SEA STARS ARE MELTING by Mary Kay Neumann The largest marine disaster that has ever been recorded has taken place in the ocean. Over the next two years, as geographically diverse populations continued to crash, scientists coined the term sea star wasting disease (SSWD) to refer to the unexplained forces that were causing the devastation. The combination of ocean warming and an infectious wasting disease has devastated populations of large sunflower sea stars once abundant along the West Coast of North America in just a few years, according to research co-led by the University of California, Davis, and Cornell University published Jan. 30 in the journal Science Advances. They congregated to eat barnacles and mussels but also appeared to become less active at this time. In what Hewson describes as a “flurry of emails” from research groups up and down the coast, a pattern started to emerge. The initial outbreak of Sea Star Wasting Disease killed all 18 of the aquarium’s sunflower stars, along with dozens of others spread across different species. The outbreak of sea star wasting syndrome that began in 2013 devastated many species of sea stars along the North American West Coast. In this image there are approximately 12 stars per square metre. This is especially Dubbed SEA STAR WASTING DISEASE (SSWD), this phenomenon quickly spread through the entire SUNFLOWER STAR population, killing an estimated tens of thousands in Howe Sound alone.