Huge cold-water coral reef discovered off US coast

It is said to be one of the largest deep-sea coral reefs ever discovered in the world. Previous studies of the area had already found coral mounds near the coast and in shallower water. But only after the so-called Blake Plateau has been fully mapped at a depth of 500 to 1000 meters will it be known “how extensive this habitat is and how many of these coral mounds are connected.”

The mapping took ten years
The discovery was preceded by ten years of systematic mapping of the area and more than twenty exploratory dives. The results of the research project, which involved NOAA and other US authorities, were published on January 12 in the scientific journal “Geomatics”.

According to the researchers, cold-water corals grow at temperatures between 4 and 14 degrees in the deep sea, where there is no sunlight. The so-called cnidarians feed on suspended substances in the water. So far, cold-water coral reefs have been discovered off the coasts of at least 41 countries, the study said. Scientists believe the disease will spread even further, but most of the deep sea has not yet been explored and mapped.

Reefs are extremely vulnerable at depth
It is said that the reefs grow slowly at depth and are therefore vulnerable to physical damage from human activities. The biggest threats to cold-water corals include bottom trawl fishing, the extraction of raw materials from the deep sea and the construction of underwater cables and pipelines.