Playa del Carmen, Quintana Roo — A heavy influx of sargassum has once again hit the coastline of Playa del Carmen, overwhelming a barrier installed by the Mexican Navy and piling up on the main beaches of this Riviera Maya tourist hub.
For three days, Navy personnel have joined cleanup efforts as the seaweed arrival has placed two of the main beaches under yellow (abundant) and red (excessive) alerts, according to the sargassum traffic light system used by Quintana Roo’s Ecology and Environment Department.
Officials expect the brown algae patch to advance further north over the weekend, driven by southeast currents.
According to data from the Federal Maritime Terrestrial Zone office in Playa del Carmen, crews are collecting around 100 tons of sargassum per day during this new high-influx period. Just a month ago, during Easter vacation, the beaches were clean and the sea was its characteristic turquoise blue.
This year marks 11 years since the phenomenon began affecting Mexico’s top tourist destinations, the Riviera Maya and Cancún, which together host more than 110,000 hotel rooms.
More than a decade after the first major arrivals, no government has managed to stop the algae’s advance — not even the barriers deployed by the Mexican Navy, which has been directly responsible for containment since 2021 under former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
José Gómez Burgos, leader of the Caribbean Sea tourism cooperative in Playa del Carmen, said the Navy’s barrier is now insufficient for a port like this one. Ferries carrying passengers to the island of Cozumel generate strong waves that destabilize the structure, allowing sargassum to pass through and reach the coastal dunes where hotels and restaurants have been built.
