Largest-ever coral found in Pacific — and can be seen from space
Good reef!
The largest coral ever recorded has been discovered by scientists in the Solomon Islands.
Sitting at 18 feet high, 112 feet wide, and 105 feet long, the massive coral is bigger than a blue whale and is visible from space, according to the announcement at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Baku, Azerbaijan.
“I went diving in a place where the map said there was a shipwreck and then I saw something,” Manu San Felix, a cinematographer with National Geographic Society’s Pristine Seas, told the BBC.
To his surprise, it wasn’t a ship but a “cathedral underwater.”
San Felix, and his son Inigo, dove to inspect the mass and were moved by the experience of discovering something so massive, ancient and unique.
“It’s very emotional. I felt this huge respect for something that’s stayed in one place and survived for hundreds of years,” the fortunate diver told the outlet.
Scientists believe that the coral has been growing between 300 to 500 years.
Coral is comprised of tiny individual creatures called polyps, which form a connected hardened shell when living en masse in a colony. The average polyp grows to about a quarter of an inch.
function as a single organism. NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC PRISTINE SEAS/AFP via Getty Images
Over 1 billion coral polyps make up the newly discovered colony, according to National Geographic.
Most corals are dome-shaped, but this newly discovered mass is remarkably flat, according to Molly Timmers, the study’s lead.
Timmers says the discovery gives her hope for an environmentally healthy future.
“You have this life pillar that’s still there,” she told Nat Geo.
“It gives you this awe, this hope. Just seeing how big it is — the mega coral —- and its survival in an area that wasn’t as healthy.”
The scientist believes the mega coral’s location — which is in deeper, cooler waters than where most reefs are found — has protected it from possible environmental calamities and allowed it to expand so profusely.
Environmental scientists say coral reefs around are under siege due to rising water temperatures that are a byproduct of carbon emissions.
