Are we there yet?': Fears that 'significant' coral mortality still to come

The world is 33 months into its biggest recorded coral bleaching event with little sign of it ending, raising the prospect that coral mortality on the Great Barrier Reef will increase "significantly" from the quarter already lost in the past year, scientists say.

Eyes are on us: Coral bleaching has
 returned to the Great Barrier Reef -
and other reefs - in 2017. 

"Is this the global bleaching event that doesn't go away?", said Mark Eakin, coordinator of the Coral Reef Watch run by the US National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration. "The patterns that we are seeing in the [forecast] models are looking very similar to what we saw in the last two years.”

Read Peter Hannam’s story in today’s Melbourne Age - “‘Are we there yet?': Fears that 'significant' coral mortality still to come.”