How an underwater heat wave is bleaching coral reefs worldwide

Richard Vevers, an Executive Director at XL Catlin Seaview Survey told Christian Science Monitor that the destruction rising temperatures could cause was not to be underestimated. Now NOAA says we’re in the midst of the third ever such event that has dire implications for biodiversity, fisheries, and the overall health of our oceans. The second image was taken in February 2015 when the XL Catlin Seaview Survey responded to a NOAA coral bleaching alert. Acting on NOAA’s dire predictions for this year, they captured images of the event unfolding.

Scientists have warned that the world faces mass global coral bleaching next year driven by the warming effects of the El Nino weather phenomenon – and it could be the worst on record.

Coral reefs worldwide are in danger of succumbing to bleaching. That’s according to a report released Thursday by an global coalition of ocean experts, reef mappers and monitoring teams documenting the worldwide coral bleaching crisis. “And it’s on all the islands”.

Of course, this will threaten the entire existence of all coral across the plant. They said that fueled by climate change, record high temperature session in parts of the oceans is likely to kill over 12,000 sq kms of reefs, or about 5% of the global total.

A vast mass of warm water known as “The Blob” in the north eastern Pacific has harmed corals, including in Hawaii, it said. The middle Florida Keys aren’t too bad, but in southeast Florida, bleaching has combined with disease to kill corals, Eakin said.

The last super El Nino, in 1997-1998, was the first global bleaching event. The second bleaching event was triggered by the El Niño of 2010. The coral scientists estimate we’ve lost 40 percent of corals around the globe in the last 30 years alone. However, it’s going to be one of the worsts, with areas such as Australia’s Great Barrier Reef predicted to be hit the hardest. “Although reefs represent less than 0.1 percent of the world’s ocean floor, they help support approximately 25 percent of all marine species”.

“The coral bleaching and disease, brought on by climate change and coupled with events like the current El Niño, are the largest and most pervasive threats to coral reefs around the world”, said Mark Eakin, NOAA’s Coral Reef Watch coordinator. Dead reefs quickly degrade and erode-meaning less shoreline protection from storms and loss of habitat for fish and other marine life as well as serious impacts on tourist income and those half a billion people around the world who rely on reefs for food. The phenomenon causes coral reefs to expel the algae in their tissues and turn completely white.