Expect “unprecedented” health problems and death in coral species across the world throughout 2024, coral scientist Ove Hoegh-Guldberg said ...
Published on by Water Network Research, Official research team of The Water Network
Research suggests extreme marine heatwaves have contributed to climate change on coral reefs for four-plus decades. Now, “mass coral bleaching and mortality” may have reached a “tipping point,” according to Hoegh-Guldberg.
What’s happening?
Coral “bleaches,” or turns white, when it’s exposed to disease, storms, sediments, or other stressors, according to the Australian Institute of Marine Science.
Mass coral bleaching happens primarily because of an increase in water temperature. During this time, coral across a region lose their brown microbial algae and turn white. The phenomenon can also cause coral to die altogether.
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Abstract
The upper ocean is undergoing unprecedented changes in conditions, ecosystems, and communities. These changes can be traced back to the early 1980s, when mass coral bleaching first appeared. Marine heatwave (MHW)–driven events are strongly correlated with rising sea surface temperature (SST) and climate cycles such as El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). SSTs in 2023 have been starkly different because extreme MHWs have engulfed much of the eastern tropical Pacific (ETP) and wider Caribbean. Many Caribbean reef areas experienced historically high heat stress that started much earlier (1 to 2 months) and was sustained for longer than the usual recorded seasonal changes. Patterns of SST from the past 40 years indicate that unprecedented mass coral bleaching and mortality will likely occur across the Indo-Pacific throughout 2024. These trends will worsen unless greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions decrease, with coral-dominated ecosystems likely to face substantial losses, leading to long-term damage to ecosystems and people across Earth’s tropical regions (1).
Sources:https://www.thecooldown.com/green-tech/mass-coral-bleaching-2024-forecast/, https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adk4532
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