Have you ever tried snorkeling or scuba diving around coral reefs? I did that several times when I was younger and loved it. The beauty is almost indescribable.
Losing these reefs – as now seems all but unavoidable – is a tragedy in so many ways. It crushes biodiversity, threatens to disrupt the ocean food chain, and leaves us bereft of some of nature's most glorious wonders.
For the fifth time in just the past eight summers – 2016, 2017, 2020, 2022, and now 2024 – huge swathes of the Great Barrier Reef are experiencing extreme heat stress that has triggered yet another episode of mass coral bleaching.
The most conspicuous impact of unusually high temperatures on tropical and subtropical reefs is wide-scale coral bleaching and death. Sharp spikes in temperature can destroy coral tissue directly even before bleaching unfolds. Consequently, if temperatures exceed 2°C above the normal summer maximum, heat-sensitive corals die very quickly.
Given the near-record levels of heat stress this summer, we can expect heavy losses of corals to occur on hundreds of individual reefs over the next few months.
This latest, still-unfolding event was entirely predictable, as ocean temperatures continue to rise due to global heating.
The only long-term way to protect corals on the Great Barrier Reef and elsewhere is to rapidly reduce global greenhouse emissions.
@breadandcircuses@binaryphile I was lucky enough to dive Palau in the early 90s and Raja Ampat before dynamite fishing became significant. People have no idea of how the biomass has declined. Our oceans are already a shadow of what they were just decades ago. Here in Hawai'i the 2017 El Nino eliminated all but remnants of one our most common and beautiful coral species. The phylum is hardy, but the ecosystems are fragile.
The only tried and true method of drastically and immediately reducing ghgs (without causing further environmental damage) is to have a lockdown similar to the covid lockdown of 2020, but modified, better implemented and for a longer period of time.
Worried about the inconvenience?
Not half as worried as your children and grandchildren will be 10 to 20 years.
Worried about the economy?
Our current economic systems worldwide are based on and thrive on the exploitive actions that causes ghgs emissions.
We have the luxury now of making these changes in the best ways possible.
Your children and grandchildren won't have that if we do nothing; it will be forced on them by the mounting climate changes happening now and accelerating faster every year.
Yeap, it was fun and exciting, till a huge barracuda crossed in front of my mask
I never realized they form is shallow waters so they can breath oxygen and this makes them prone to being scarred by anchors of big and little boats. A tiny break of the surface can kill hundreds of square feet of the organism. @breadandcircuses
@breadandcircuses I do not endorse "see it while you can" disaster tourism. I'm sure the poster doesn't either. Flying makes the situation worse. But if you happen to be nearby already, great. Experiencing nature is important.
But the article is worth reading. Corals are a key ecosystem, supporting many species, and ultimately many people. And because of ocean warming, they're in immediate danger.