Coral reefs all over the world are showing damage from various causes. Some of this may be from direct impacts from people living and vacationing near reefs. Other effects may be from global change like increased water temperatures. To learn about problems at coral reefs around the world, click on the map at the various sites we have dived in over the years.

Pacific Ocean	Atlantic Ocean	Indian Ocean
Hawaii Midway Panama Galapagos Easter Island Pitcairn Island Tahiti	Bermuda Florida Keys Puerto Rico Mona Island (P.R.) Aruba Bonaire Panama St. Lucia	Seychelles Bird Island (Seychelles) Bali Komodo Island Great Barrier Reef, Aus. North Island, New Zealand Elat, Red Sea

Facts:

• Coral reefs are the most complex, species-rich and productive marine ecosystems.
• Reefs cover only 0.2% of the ocean's area
• They provide home to one-third of all marine fish species and tens of thousands of other species.
• Coral reefs provide essential fish habitat, support endangered and threatened species, and harbor protected marine mammals and turtles.
• Coral reef fisheries yield 6 million metric tons of fish catch annually, with one quarter of the total worldwide fish production in developing countries with coral reefs.
• On U.S. reefs, over 500 commercially valuable coral reef fishes and invertebrate are under federal management, including four candidate ESA species (Spurgeon 1992; NOAA 1996). Coral reefs provide critical protection to coastlines from storm damage, erosion and flooding by reducing wave action.
• Coral reefs are crucial sources of income and resources through their role in tourism, fisheries, building materials and as an important source of pharmaceutical compounds.
• Coral reefs worldwide have experienced widespread declines in coral species abundance and live coral coverage worldwide over the last two decades.
• The 1998 Reefs at Risk report estimated that 58% of the world's coral reefs are threatened by human activity, including coastal development, destructive and over-fishing practices, overexploitation of marine resources, marine pollution, and increased terrestrial runoff associated with agriculture and deforestation.
• Human impacts are being exacerbated by natural events such as coral disease, crown-of thorns sea star outbreaks, and tropical storms and hurricanes (Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network, 1998). Among the greatest threats are elevated sea water temperatures and increased CO2 concentrations due to greenhouse gas emissions. In 1998, this caused the most geographically extensive and severe coral reef bleaching event in recorded history, with subsequent mortality affecting 70-80 % of all shallow-water corals on many Indo-Pacific reefs.
• Reef Check surveys conducted in 1997 and 1998 found that most reefs are severely overfished and most high value organisms such as grouper, lobster and giant clams are missing (Hodgson, 1999). It has been estimated that at least 1200 marine species may have become extinct in the last few hundred years, mostly unknown species that inhabit coral reefs (Malakoff 1995).
• For a recent assessment of the status of U.S. coral reefs see NOAA's online State of the Coast Report.