The Great Barrier Reef: A Farewell

It can be seen from space. It spans an area about the size of Germany. It is (was?) the largest living structure in the world. It is a combined compilation of 3,000 reefs spanning 2,000km. It is the home of over 1,600 species of fish, 130 types of sharks, and more than 30 species of whales and dolphins. It is an underwater world of incomprehensible proportions, and it is one of most fragile and complex ecosystems on the entire planet. The Great Barrier Reef.

The Reef is dying, and human defiance and climate change has everything to do with this tragedy. It is easy to say that we do not live near it, we don't feel the affects of its death, and that we do not see this as a huge problem, but that is simply not the case. Our oceans and their prosperity directly parallel our lives and prosperity, and the failure of our oceans will result in noticeable adverse phenomenon in our lives as well.

To understand what is going on with the reef and how this affects a perplexing number of global citizens, it is crucial to internalize what exactly is physically taking place there. The process of the dying reef starts with the phenomenon of bleaching. Bleaching of coral occurs when the water temperatures are too warm for a consistent period of time and subsequently stresses out the coral polyps to the point where they spew out the algae that lives inside of them. The algae that emerges takes away the colorful algae that we typically attribute to thriving coral, thus revealing the dull white and transparent skeleton of the coral. At this point, the algae begins to starve and die permanently because algae provides the coral with roughly 90% of its energy at any given time. Coral that was once vibrant and thriving is now covered in a thick seaweed, which grows as a result of bleaching and death of the coral and can take up to 10 years to reverse if a very specific set of extreme circumstances occurs. We are seeing now that revival is only possible if there is an extreme and consistent drop in water temperature, and help administered by policy change which seems unlikely in Australia and the world.

So what does this mean? It translates directly to a complete meltdown of an entire ecosystem, one that many organisms and humans depend on. It starts small, but the affects becomes widespread. Fish species that depend on the coral for shelter and food either die or relocate, the bigger predator fish that feed on the smaller fish die or move as well, birds that feed on the fish lose their main food source, land plants that benefit from their droppings die out, and humans who rely on the reef for food , shelter, and protection lose a vital resource. Given that humans are generally self-serving, this idea is perhaps the most frightening and will affect roughly half a billion people around the world.

With all this said, we need to be clear that this is not happening naturally. While minor bleaching has occurred throughout history with some natural fluctuations in water temperature, a massive spike first noticeable in 1979, correlates directly with the warming of the atmosphere. Regardless of your stance on global warming as a concept, the affects and statistics behind it are undeniable on reefs around the world. There have been 3 major periods of coral bleaching and death, and with climate change becoming more prominent, records are not hard to beat. The three massive periods of this occurred in 1988, 2002, and now in 2016: each occurrence exponentially increasing in severity and urgency. According to ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, about 90% of excess heat and carbon trapped in our atmosphere goes directly to the oceans and increases surface temperature. This increase in temperature brings coral to the brink of stress by consistently forcing them to attempt to survive temperatures in which they simply are not about to thrive at.

Our oceans are too precious, and too imperative for our lives. While you may not have the same passion for the ocean as some of us thalassophiles do, this should alarm you. It is our duty as humans to do what we can, and we have consistently failed to do so, thus bringing us to this point. The reefs could die indefinitely, and we will collectively be the ones to blame. "Bouncing back" is no longer a possibility, and our only hope at saving the reefs lies in policy change, global support, and decrease in fossil fuels which contribute to global warming. Everyone can help, even if that help is simply educating yourself on the issues and committing to the environment for the greater good of the future of our oceans and our world.

Sourses: The Guardian 

  National Geographic