Michael Slezak - Great Barrier Reef: aerial survey reveals extent of coral bleaching
An aerial survey is
revealing the worst bleaching ever seen on northern parts of the Great Barrier
Reef, as the scientist leading the survey live-tweets the devastation and
pleads for the world to take action on climate change.
Last week Terry
Hughes, a professor at James Cook University and convener of the National Coral Bleaching
Taskforce, told Guardian Australia he planned to hire a charter plane and map
the bleaching to see how bad it was.
They would start from
Cairns and fly north, he said. “We’ll expand that initial aerial survey to
crisscross the whole northern region and map it all out.” Now, using both planes
and helicopters, Hughes has found what he says is the worst bleaching in the
region he has ever seen.
On Tuesday, Hughes
said he surveyed 600km of reef and found that more than 60% of it had been
bleached. That was just two days
after the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority raised
the threat level of coral bleaching to the highest possible alert,
“level 3” , indicating “severe regional bleaching” in the northernmost quarter
of the 344,400 sq km marine park.
On Wednesday Hughes
upgraded to a helicopter and continued the survey... read more:
