“It was 25 million years old.” "[But] there is a disconnect in the policy around governments issuing permits for 60 years for new coal mines and how that might impact on the Great Barrier Reef and reefs more generally." They thrive in warm water, but only up to a point: Just two or three degrees Fahrenheit of excess warming can kill the tiny creatures. It’s Getting More Widespread. The reef covers 300,000 square kilometers and has more than 3,000 reefs. The 1,400-mile-long reef has been bleached so severely that almost every one of the 2,900 individual reefs have little to no life left. The Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest coral reef, covers nearly 133,000 square miles and is home to more than 1,500 species of fish, 411 species of hard corals and dozens of other species. Contrary to popular belief, the Great Barrier Reef is not entirely dead. The 2,300 kilometer (1,400 mile) long wonder of the natural world—home to 2,900 individual reefs, 1,500 species of fish, and 900 islands—has had obituaries written for it multiple times over the last few years. But it is in trouble. “The Great Barrier Reef of Australia passed away in 2016 after a long illness,” Outside Magazine declared this week in a viral obituary. Reef Magic operates two vessels – one which takes visitors on a day trip to the Great Barrier Reef and another vessel reserved for their Reef Education and Research Program, for school groups. The cause of death was listed as coral bleaching, which happens when warming oceans cause corals to expel their algae, preventing them from getting the nutrients necessary to survive. Great Barrier Reef (CNN)Andy Ridley is shivering in a wet T-shirt on the deck of the Dreamtime after coming up from a dive on the outer edge of Australia's Great Barrier Reef. Climate & Environment. The world’s oceans, which absorb 93 percent of the heat trapped by the greenhouse gases that humans send into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels, are warming up 40 percent faster on average than scientists estimated six years ago. It covers more than 300,000 square kilometers and consists of … The Great Barrier Reef—which, at 1,400 miles long, is the longest and largest coral reef in the world—was blanketed by dangerously hot water in the summer of 2016. However, many took issue with the declaration that the Great Barrier Reef was dead. Huge sections of the Great Barrier Reef, stretching across hundreds of miles of its most pristine northern sector, were recently found to be dead, killed last year by overheated seawater. Australia’s Great Barrier Reef is the biggest of this type, stretching for over 1,400 miles off the coast of Queensland in the Coral Sea. The reef has experienced coral bleaching events before, starting back in 1998 (the Outside piece wrongly cited 1981 as the first such event). The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest coral reef ecosystem and a UNESCO World Heritage site. Being the world’s largest structure made up of billions of living coral polyps, the GBR supports many other living organisms leading to it being labelled a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the seven natural wonders of the world. The Great Barrier Reef Outlook Report spells out the challenges. Coral reefs undergo bleaching as a result of temperature changes and can recover if conditions return to normal. Credit: Tourism and Events Queensland Their advice was clear: the Reef isn’t dead. Business. But it is in trouble. Other evidence suggests that even within places of severe bleaching, there are some extended areas that are alive and colorful. The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority conducted a survey and found that 22% of the coral had died from coral bleaching, but the rest of it could still recover. Below are the reasons given for each argument. “This is a transition from high diversity and lots of species, to lower diversity, with fewer tougher species,” Professor Hughes said. But in many areas of the reef, for miles and miles, corals that were once colorful are now white, brittle and broken, or gray and covered with unsightly bacteria. A video explainer on coral bleaching, the No. The Great Barrier Reef is not entirely dead — it is large enough to support swaths of healthy coral. Almost a quarter of the coral on the Great Barrier Reef is now dead, according to two government agencies, with the previously pristine remote northern sections worst affected.. The largest coral reef in the world, the Great Barrier Reef (GBR), is in the Coral Sea off the Australian Coast in Queensland and is also visible from outer space. Equally, divers, biologists, and locals report that marine life within the GBR is flourishing with turtles, tropical fish, sharks, and underwater creatures among others. CNN recently posted an article disclaiming that the Great Barrier Reef is dead stating there is a difference between “dead” and dying”. They’re sensitive creatures. Tracy Ainsworth, a marine biologist at the University of New South Wales, was working with a team on Heron Island, in the southern section of the Great Barrier Reef that bleached this year for the first time. The survey amounts to an updated X-ray for a dying patient, with the markers of illness being the telltale white of coral that has lost its color, visible from the air and in the water. 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