3rd Global Coral Bleaching Event Since 1998 Now Apparently Under Way

[hatrack]

Coral reefs around the world — from Hawaii to the iconic Great Barrier Reef, eastward all the way to the Bahamas and beyond — are in jeopardy of being severely damaged or even dying because of a dangerous spike in ocean temperatures, scientists say.

Conditions are so dire that, provided coral bleaching soon spreads from the Florida Keys to the Bahamas, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is expected to declare as soon as two weeks from now that the third global coral bleaching event is here. There's already evidence of coral bleaching in three major ocean basins.

“It's like watching a slow-motion train wreck, and we’re waiting for the cars to pile up on this side of the track,” says Mark Eakin, the coordinator of NOAA's Coral Reef Watch, in an interview with Mashable. The previous two such global events, in 1997-98 and 2010, devastated reefs around the world, some of which have not yet recovered. Global bleaching events are becoming more common because of global warming, with many coral reefs expected to perish by the middle of the century if recent trends continue. Other reefs, which can survive in a broader temperature range, may prove more resilient.



NiñoOn maps showing the outlook for coral bleaching, this event resembles a red crocodile. The mouth of the beast is projected to bite down on the western Pacific by mid-October, devouring reefs from Hawaii to Palau. After that, even more coral bleaching is likely from the Indian Ocean to the South Pacific, as the Southern Hemisphere summer kicks in. This, the projections show, will include Australia's iconic Great Barrier Reef, which is a top tourist destination.



EDIT

http://mashable.com/2015/09/24/third-global-coral-bleaching-event/#MtQdYik0puqu

[RiverLover]

1. Heartbreaking. /nt

[Divernan]

2. I saw a coral dead zone in the Bahamas back in 2004

I was scuba diving from a live aboard dive boat out of Nassau, The Bahamas. We were in the Exuma islands when I hit a patch of water warmer than I'd ever experienced under water. Checked my dive computer and the water was 85 degrees. Typically the water temps on that trip's dives were 72 - 75 degrees. As we continued our dive, we found ourselves in a dead zone - all the coral bleached white and not a single bit of plant or fish life at the micro or macro level. That was 11 years ago.

I just checked on that boat's (The Aquacat) website and found the reported water temps in the Bahamas for July through August, 2015 to be 83 to 87 degrees. "We have had water temperatures as cold as 65º F and as high as 96º F on the banks. The water temperatures on the offshore reefs aren’t this extreme as the bank water mixes with the offshore moderating it when the tide is dropping."