Two-thirds of the Great Barrier Reef has now been devastated by severe coral bleaching, with the most intense damage occurring further south this year, Queensland scientists say.

Key Points:

Of the 2,300km of reef, 1,500km is bleached
Middle third section has most intense bleaching, southern third unscathed
Caused from record-breaking temperature
The fastest growing coral will take a decade to recover
An aerial survey of the reef's 2,300-kilometre length by the Australian Research Council's Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies showed 1,500km had been bleached.

Compared to its 2016 survey, where the northern third was worst off, this year the central third — Cooktown down to Townsville — recorded the most intense bleaching.

The southern third is unscathed.

The council's director, Terry Hughes, who undertook the aerial survey both years, said record-breaking temperatures, driven by global warming, has led to the bleaching.

He said it would take the fastest growing coral in the 1,500km stretch about a decade to recover.

Global Coral Bleaching 2014-2017: Status and an Appeal for Observations

In 2014, NOAA Coral Reef Watch wrote in Reef Encounter about the prospect for a 2014-15 El Niño (Eakin et al. 2014). While that El Niño never fully formed, it did help set off a multi-year global coral bleaching event -- the third ever documented. A subsequent 2015-16 strong El Niño formed, spreading and worsening the bleaching (Eakin et al. 2016), and a La Niña reared its head thereafter, further extending the event into 2017, as predicted. Multiple coral reef areas around the world experienced bleaching two or even three years in a row from 2014-2017. As of June 2017, the Third Global Coral Bleaching Event has most likely ended (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) 2017) but will remain the longest, most widespread, and possibly the most damaging coral bleaching event on record. It affected more reefs than any previous global bleaching event and was worse in some locales (e.g., Great Barrier Reef, Kiribati, Jarvis Island). Heat stress during this event also caused mass bleaching in several reefs that never bleached before (e.g., northernmost Great Barrier Reef).


Coral Reef Watch's Analysis of Current Thermal Conditions and Four-Month Outlook

NOAA Coral Reef Watch's most recent Coral Bleaching Alert Area is below. This figure shows the regions currently experiencing high levels of heat stress that can cause coral bleaching.

The last glacial period, popularly known as the Ice Age, was the most recent glacial period, which occurred from c. 110,000 – c. 11,700 years ago. This most recent glacial period is part of a larger pattern of glacial and interglacial periods known as the Quaternary glaciation (c. 2,588,000 years ago to present). From this point of view, scientists consider this "ice age" to be merely the latest glaciation event in a much larger ice age, one that dates back over two million years and is still ongoing.

oh dear....

what don't you understand about the Earth being a dynamic system Monk?

What don't you understand about the Earth's climate forever changing?

It's land mass forever changing gee you should know something about that at least eh BSc Geology.

What don't you understand about extinctions?

What don't you understand about adaptation?  BSc Zoology?

I'm sorry I can't hear you?

You do realise the world has been hotter and colder....  right?

You do realise that the last Ice Age lasted for a great many years right?

Quote:


Do you accept that there were Woolly Mammoths?  Sabre Toothed Tigers?  Triceratops? Stegosaurus?  Dodos?
The list goes on and on and on...  the Earth is not static.