Great Barrier Reef Rebounds From Crisis

Parts of the Great Barrier Reef bleached by warming waters 3 years ago have made a speedy recovery because of a few lucky breaks, the Guardian reports. Reefs typically take at least a decade to overcome human-created crises, but a combination of biological factors helped the reef's speedy healing, Australian scientists conclude in a new study.

"We know that reefs can recover—given the chance," said one scientist, citing the aftermath of the die-off created by El Niño in 1998. "Unfortunately, impacts on the scale of 1998 will reoccur in the near future, and there's no time to lose if we want to give reefs and people a chance to suffer as little as possible."
(More coral reef stories.)