[Coral-List] Spratly Island update

[Mark Eakin]

Thanks for keeping up the pressure on this one, John.  Nice issue on the cover of today’s Washington Post weekly Health and Science section:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/what-happens-to-a-coral-reef-when-an-island-is-built-on-top/2015/07/06/d409493c-168b-11e5-9518-f9e0a8959f32_story.html <http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/what-happens-to-a-coral-reef-when-an-island-is-built-on-top/2015/07/06/d409493c-168b-11e5-9518-f9e0a8959f32_story.html>

Cheers,
Mark
------------------------------------------------------------------
C. Mark Eakin, Ph.D.
Coordinator, NOAA Coral Reef Watch
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Center for Satellite Applications and Research
Satellite Oceanography & Climate Division
e-mail: mark.eakin at noaa.gov
url: coralreefwatch.noaa.gov

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Congressman Newt Gingrich, A Contract with the Earth, 2007

> On Jun 19, 2015, at 1:14 PM, John McManus <jmcmanus at rsmas.miami.edu> wrote:
> 
> Journalist Victor Robert Lee has just published an article with
> high-resolution comparative satellite images of some of the island-building
> sites in the Spratly Island Group
> (http://thediplomat.com/2015/06/south-china-sea-satellite-images-show-pace-o
> f-chinas-subi-reef-reclamation/). Beginning with the second image, you can
> click on them for full resolution. They show that, as with Fiery Cross Reef,
> all near-surface portions of Subi Reef are now gone - permanently. Paving
> has begun. 
> 
> 
> 
> Large portions of Mischief Reef are now gone as well. Based on a rough
> measure of the mean diameter of 7 km from the undisturbed reef in Google
> Earth, it looks as if the loss covers more than 50 % of the perimeter of (7
> x Pi =) 22 km, or about 11 km. For an island width of roughly 0.5 km, that
> gives us a conservative estimate of permanent loss of roughly 5.5 square
> kilometers, or 5,500,000 square meters - all from just one of the seven
> islands being built. Of course, this does not include the immense damage to
> the lagoon from the dredging, and to the rest of the reef from the abrasive
> coral sands which have been stirred up. 
> 
> 
> 
> During my visit in the 1990's, the reefs in this area within the southern
> Spratly Islands were among the most amazing I had ever seen. Along one
> vertical wall, I hovered cross-legged for nearly an hour watching large
> schools of fish taking turns zipping by along diagonal lines upwards and
> downwards, as if I was watching traffic on a busy intersection. At one
> point, everything got quite dark. I assumed a very dark cloud had blocked
> the sun. I was too busy watching the reaction of the fish to look up. Later,
> my dive buddy who had been stationed above, told me that the darkness was
> due to the passage overhead of an enormous school of hammerhead sharks. 
> 
> 
> 
> This week, the relevant government announced that the island-building will
> end soon, and that it will focus on building up infrastructure on the new
> islands. It stated "Impact on coral reef ecology is localised, temporary,
> controllable and restorable."
> (http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/19/southchinasea-china-environment-i
> dUSL3N0Z52YK20150619).
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> John
> 
> 
> 
> John W. McManus, PhD
> 
> Director, National Center for Coral Reef Research (NCORE)
> 
> Professor, Marine Biology and Ecology
> 
> Coral Reef Ecology and Management Lab (CREM Lab)
> 
> Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS)
> 
> University of Miami, 4600 Rickenbacker Causeway, Miami, 33149
> 
> <mailto:jmcmanus at rsmas.miami.edu> jmcmanus at rsmas.miami.edu
> <http://ncore.rsmas.miami.edu/> http://ncore.rsmas.miami.edu/
> 
> <https://www.researchgate.net/profile/John_Mcmanus4>
> https://www.researchgate.net/profile/John_Mcmanus4
> 
> 
> 
> "If you lose a diamond ring in the bedroom, don't look for it in the living
> room just because the light there is better".
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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