That is a bummer but what worries me a lot more is the human impacts such as agricultural runoff and the slew of problems that comes with climate change (ocean acidification being a scary one). The corals will bounce back from the natural cycles (El Nino and Pacific Decadal Oscillation) like they have done for 100s of millions of years but they have never had to deal with the human factors.
This. Funny how Faux News spins this as the fault of El Nino.
That is a bummer but what worries me a lot more is the human impacts such as agricultural runoff and the slew of problems that comes with climate change (ocean acidification being a scary one). The corals will bounce back from the natural cycles (El Nino and Pacific Decadal Oscillation) like they have done for 100s of millions of years but they have never had to deal with the human factors.
Mother nature is pretty resilient.
That's why more creatures are extinct today than 200 years ago. We're the equivalent of a meteor strike (not sure how big)... the mother nature that recovers won't be the same - and we may not like her very much...
I think we seriously underestimate the sheer resilience of the coral species to withstand any Global catastrophe.
let me rephrase:
there are more extinct species today than there were 200 years ago, and it's due to human activity.
So there are more extinct species now than were 200 years ago, that is a profound statement.
Here's the noaa statement that the news article summarizes http://www.noaa.gov/el-niño-prolongs-longest-global-coral-bleaching-event
Basically, man-made global warming is making it more difficult for reefs to recover in between normal events like El Niño.