Coral Bleaching

I chose the article Global Warming Is Killing the Great Barrier Reef by Kacey Deamer This article is reliable because it is only four days old and from a reliable website. It is also reliable because I found other articles supporting the data presented in this article. This article is about how global climate change is killing the Great Barrier Reef. This article is about how scientists have returned to the Great Barrier Reef to measure the coral bleaching that has occurred this summer. Coral Bleaching is when corals are stressed from phenomena such as warmer-than-average waters for an extended period of time. The corals, which are actually little organisms called coral polyps, expel the algae that lend them their color and provide them with food, giving the coral a bleached appearance.
Calicle forms the structure of coral reefs. Scientists are nervous because the severity of the 2016 bleaching was off the chart. The catastrophic bleaching last year impacted a region of the reef approximately 500 miles (800 km) in length. (The entire reef is about 133,000 square miles, or 344,400 square kilometers.) Heat waves in 1998 and 2002 also resulted in vast bleaching of the reef. Previous exposure to bleaching does not make coral reefs any more resistant to new bleaching events. Measurements of the bleaching extent this year may show that 2017 was the fourth major event. With rising temperatures, due to global climate change, it is only a matter of time before we see more of these events. A fourth event after only one year is a significant blow to the reef. While poor water quality and overfishing can also stress coral reefs, climate change — and the resulting warmer oceans — is the leading cause of bleaching.