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Scientists Discover Hidden Deep-Sea Coral Reef Off South Carolina Coast (cnn.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: Little is known about the natural resources of the deep ocean off the United States' Southeast coast from Virginia to Georgia, so Deep Search 2018 was created to learn more by exploring the deep sea ecosystems. The project, consisting of scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, and the US Geological Survey, is nearing the end of its 15-day voyage aboard the research vessel Atlantis. A pair of dives in a submersible called Alvin confirmed the existence of the coral reef last week, and based on observations, researchers estimate the reef is at least 85 miles long. "This is a huge feature," expedition chief scientist Dr. Erik Cordes told HuffPost. "It's incredible that it stayed hidden off the US East Coast for so long." Cordes said the ecosystem is unlike anything he has seen, with "mountains" of corals.
>"This is a huge feature," expedition chief scientist Dr. Erik Cordes told HuffPost. "It's incredible that it stayed hidden off the US East Coast for so long."
I bet the U.S. Navy knew it was there but wasn't about to let the rest of the world know about it.
Trump may have stumbled across some oil and the deep state are trying to prevent him from getting at it.
"It's incredible that it stayed hidden off the US East Coast for so long."
Well off course it stayed hidden. It did not want to be destroyed like most other coral reefs around the world. If I was treated like that, I would stay hidden as well.
Nae king! Nae laird! Nae yurrupiean pressedent! We willna be fooled again!
Just saying...
...I'd say its days are numbered.
Apparently the Great Barrier Reef has moved in and out from the Australian coast line as the sea levels have risen and fallen with each ice age. From memory the difference in sea levels is about 30 meters.
This reef could very well be a remanent coral reef from the last ice age and has evolved / adjusted to continue surviving at about 30 meters depth (which could also be the limit of light penetrating the ocean).
The largest ships (oil tankers / cruise ships) have a draft between 12 to 20 meters so there is sufficient clearance that if these reefs are indeed in 30+ meters depth of water that no-one would of paid any attention.
Time to break out my free-diving fins and mask!
Pretty much the only interesting feature they may want to hide is topography, for obvious reason, but that also can't stay really hidden for very obvious reason too that oceanography scientist, and anybody with sonar frankly, can measure the depth and make precise map. What this article about is only they found coral where none was found, and frankly that would not bring anything for the navy or anybody to keep it secret. This ins't about topographic feature again, this is about the local ecology of those known topological features.
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One thing I thought interesting about this was something mentioned in the story in passing, the use of the submersible Alvin which has been in use longer than most /. readers have been alive. It was launched in 1964. It is something like the Ship of Theseus though, it has been through many upgrades and replacements including a new titanium pressure hull in 1973.
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Gotta MAGMA!! That reef is holding us back!!
Alright everyone, time to get to work destroying this thing!
I just read the other day about how manmade global warming slash climate change slash cooling slash 'it's hotter than it was yesterday' slash microplastics was killing all the coral in the world.
How can we be finding these new, thriving corals?
...another coral reef we can destroy with ocean pollution. Mankind here we come!
Send Paul Allen to park his yacht over it so Gore can bitch about the climate! True fact: Paul Allen is single-handedly responsible for destroying 70% of the world's dead coral reefs by dragging his yacht anchor over them for months on end.
Or the dozens of other major missions Alvin is known for.
And actually the pressure hull has been replaced at least two more times as far as I remember. Those things are only good for a few hundred dives at-depth before being replaced.
Here's how to tell if the government is wasting money. If there's something called the "Bureau of Ocean Energy Management", it's wasting money.
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... for what, two decades at least, all i have seen in the media is how the coral reefs are disappearing due to climate change. So I pictured just a bunch of unadaptable polyps going extinct. But no, suddenly it appears that a deep reef was discovered and then it's revealed that there are such things as deep reefs, etc.
The point is, all the brouhaha over " ... it will mean the disappearance of ... " should actually be suffixed by " ... as we currently know it." So be it the climate or whatever, the fuss is really about wanting things to stay the same. And they don't. Ever. Things _cannot_ stay the same and to want or expect them to is insanity.
The challenge then is not to stop the change but instead to adapt to it and make the current state as close to what you desire as possible.
Will adaptation be free or easy? No, there is no free lunch.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.