‘Severe’ bleaching of Great Barrier Reef causes catastrophic damage

‘An unprecedented amount of coral bleaching for two consecutive years has severely damaged two-thirds of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, aerial surveys have shown.
Scientists at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies recorded severe coral bleaching for the second time in 12 months after surveying the Great Barrier Reef’s entire 2,300km-long (1,500) miles ecosystem.
“This is the fourth time the Great Barrier Reef has bleached severely – in 1998, 2002, 2016, and now in 2017. Bleached corals are not necessarily dead corals, but in the severe central region we anticipate high levels of coral loss,” said Dr. James Kerry of James Cook University.
“It takes at least a decade for a full recovery of even the fastest growing corals, so mass bleaching events 12 months apart offers zero prospect of recovery for reefs that were damaged in 2016.”’
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