NOAA Declares Third Ever Global Coral Bleaching Event

For the past year, the world’s corals have been getting increasingly pummeled by climate change.  Now with El Niño kicking ocean heat into overdrive, much of the world’s oceans have turned deadly for the world’s corals.

On Thursday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced a global coral bleaching event.  This year joins the ranks of 1997 and 2010 as the only times on record that bleaching has occurred in all three of the world’s oceans that support coral at the same time.

All three global bleaching events have occurred in El Niño years, and the climate phenomenon definitely has a role to play.  But the ever-rising temperatures underwater and above due to climate change are the biggest reason corals are currently dying off across a 4,600-square mile area in the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific oceans.

Read more at Hot Oceans Are Killing Coral Reefs Around the World