Coral discoloration affected 98 percent of the Big Barrier Reef of Australia, leaving the untouched only part of the largest system of reefs in the world. This is reported in the article published in the journal Current Biology, briefly about the study describes the press release on the Phys.org website.
Only two percent of the extensive underwater ecosystem escaped exposure from the moment of the first episode of the mass discoloration of corals in 1998, which at that time became the hottest year in the history of observations. Since then, the frequency, intensity and scale caused by the change in the climate of sea waves of heat causing coral discoloration increased.
Blooming occurs when healthy corals are stress due to splash temperature of the ocean, which is why they are deprived of algae living in their fabrics, and lose bright colors. The big barrier reef suffered from three mass discolorations during the heat waves in 2016, 2017 and 2020.
According to scientists, despite the fact that the corals demonstrated some signs of recovery after the last discoloration, long-term prospects for an ecosystem of 2300 kilometers long “are very bad”. Reef is also subject to damage from cyclones and outbreaks of sea stars of the throat crown, which eat corals, and both factors are becoming increasingly destructive due to climate change.