‘The Blob,’ a marine heat wave, caused massive die-off of West Coast birds.

The birds were found all along the coast from California to British Columbia.

The Blob started cooking the coastal waters in 2013 and persisted in 2014. It kept right on growing, creating by 2015 a mass of warm water about the size of Canada along the west coast of North America, with sea surface temperatures 3.5 degrees Celsius above the 1981-2010 norm.