Each winter and spring, the Dominican Republic braces for the arrival of sargassum—floating mats of brown seaweed drifting westward from the Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt. Once a largely offshore phenomenon, sargassum has become a persistent and increasingly disruptive presence along Caribbean coastlines.
The 2025 season marked a historic peak. Satellite monitoring recorded roughly 38 million metric tons of sargassum across the Atlantic, Caribbean, and Gulf regions in May, the highest level ever observed and nearly double the previous record set in 2022. In the Dominican Republic, coastal destinations such as Punta Cana and Bávaro faced intense sargassum arrivals, prompting expanded cleanup operations.
As 2026 begins, monitoring agencies are already
→ Continue reading at Traveling Lifestyle
