Immerse 360° activity Cards

Practice your observational skills by looking carefully at five underwater photographs of healthy reefs and comparing them with five photographs of bleached reefs — what differences do you see? Why might this be? Discuss your impressions with others, and build on their observations.

“We can’t bring everyone to the Ocean so we are using scaleable technologies to bring the Ocean to everyone.”

Dr. Erika Woolsey, Chief Scientist

We live on this incredible unfamiliar blue planet.

The ocean is this magical complex beautiful place but almost nobody sees it.

The ocean protects us, it feeds us, yet few can see how beautiful and powerful that it can be. What we don’t see we don’t connect with. So we need to look so that we can change that.

The diversity of life in the ocean is like no terrestrial place on earth.

Biodiversity is the collection of life in all its shapes and forms. We depend on biodiversity for clear water and air, for food and medicine, and for the overall resilience of our planet. At the heart of all this biodiversity in the ocean is one of the most amazing ecosystems on our planet, coral reefs. When you look at a coral reef what you see is really cathedral like. It’s is a huge structure. Coral reefs, they compete for space, so they grow side by side, one on top of the other, they create more space for other organisms to live in.

Sadly biodiversity in our oceans is declining rapidly. We are losing species before we even discover them.

On coral reefs, higher than normal ocean temperatures are causing the corals to turn white and die.

Sustained high temperatures stress out the coral animals enough to expel their symbionts which are a type of specialized algae that live in the coral tissues and provide food for their coral host. When these algae are gone you can see through the clear coral animals to their white calcium carbonate skeleton. Hence the term bleaching.

So the major threats to coral reefs are those associated with climate change.

And so the responsibility of protecting coral reefs is not limited to the people that live right beside them. We need to raise our voices for more sustainable practice, and walk the talk when it comes to our individual choices regarding sustainability as consumers.

“Witnessing first hand the coral bleaching was really life changing.”

Scientists have been carefully observing coral reefs for decades.

These ongoing monitoring programs have measured dramatic declines. Living coral cover has decreased by about 50 percent in the last fifty years. Much of this change occurred during the global bleaching event from 2015 to 2017 which was unprecedented in scale and severity.

So for me as a scientist witnessing first hand the coral bleaching in 2016 was really life changing.

What I find most hopeful is our youth and their position towards climate change.

Where many of our national leaders still choose to continue to conveniently ignore the harsh realities of climate change young people seem to generally get the issue, accept it as a fact and want to tackle this global threat.

The ocean is something that can protect itself. It just doesn’t have the voice. I think the thing that gives me the most hope for the future and for our planet is the expansion of the global movement. It is really beautiful to see these kids who completely transform and get ready to take on these global problems.

Coral Reefs are miraculous places. Life in these ecosystems can reproduce and persevere in amazing ways.

Corals can replenish themselves through mass spawning events each year when billions of gametes are released after sunset and around the full moon. The resulting larvae can drift with the water, to settle and grow new corals on degraded reefs. There’s tremendous healing power that is built into genetics and into the evolution of coral reefs and if we give them half a chance they can recover. The ocean grants you that kind of magical feeling that the land cannot really offer you. If we take it in a romantic way, the ocean is going to remain my first love.

When you see the beauty and the magic of the ocean this closely how could you not want to protect it?

I truly believe that the ocean doesn’t divide us. It connects us.

It’s not too big a problem and we can solve it. We’ve managed systems from the brink of extinction. We can do anything. We just have to allow ourselves to begin and get busy. You and I start today, that will make a difference. And if we talk to ten other people who will start today, that will make a difference. We can and we will start a movement. There is so much magic on this blue planet. You just have to look for it. And take people along with you.

The ocean is too good not to share.

“The ocean is too good not to share.”