Florida swamped by red tide – but is fertilizer plant spill making it worse?

Dolphins, manatees and 800 tons of dead fish are piling up on the state's shorelines in one of the worst algal blooms in years

Piles of dead fish, dolphins, turtles and manatees are rotting on the shorelines of coastal Florida in a soup of reddish brown ocean water after a devastating so-called red tide" algal bloom struck sea life in the region.

The city council in St Petersburg, Florida, called for a state of emergency last week saying that crews need help getting the dead sea creatures cleaned up from the beaches. In the Pinellas county area, more than 800 tons of dead fish and sea life have washed ashore - and the smell is already hitting the cities.