News

Recent tsunami pose minimal damage to coral reefs in Lau

April 14, 2022 4:25 pm

[Source: Vatuvara foundation fiji]

There have been minimal impacts on coral reefs in Lau after the recent tsunami after the volcanic eruption in Tonga

This was revealed by Conservation International Fiji after a recent survey during dive assessments.

Marine Program Manager, Kristan Miles, says they initially anticipated massive damage.

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However, their preliminary findings during the site visit in recent weeks proved otherwise.

He adds that they noticed healthy reef reefs, close to where the volcano happened but also identified damage to other sites.

“So with this research, it was a very small snapshot and a lot more research and research dives are required in order to get a full picture of the health reef system. We will need to re-visit the same sites just to look at some of these reef systems that are very large. And you could spend a significant amount of time on one of these reef systems.”

Senior Marine Program Manager Semisi Meo, says despite the minimal impacts of the volcano and tsunami, villagers in Lau continue to plant coral in a bid to sustain their marine ecosystem.

“Each of the village will be reporting on how many coral fragments are being planted and also to note there is a target of about 3, 000 coral fragments per village so with the 72 villages in Lau will surely surpass the 200,000 target by year-end.”

The team plans to re-visit these sites again in the near future to further carry out their assessment as the Lau seascape is one of the largest marine zones, which equates to at least 26 percent of Fiji’s entire marine EEZ.