UNESCO is concerned about the Reef

SPEAKER_01 0:41

You're listening to Word on the Reef, diving into marine science on the Great Barrier Reef and beyond with Tanya Murphy and Brett Goodban. Good morning everyone and welcome to Word on the Reef. I'm your host, diver, and marine conservationist, Tanya Murphy. And with me, as always, is Cairns Aquarium's marine educator and fish whisperer, Brett Goodban.

SPEAKER_00 1:09

Oh, good morning. It's nice to be back, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 1:11

Yeah, we're back. If you tuned into Cairns FM last Friday and thought, hey, where are my reef nerds? Don't worry. We didn't abandon you. It was just Easter and we were taking a break. Brett, did you get up to anything exciting?

SPEAKER_00 1:23

Well, considering I work at the largest tourist attraction in North Queensland outside the reef, I was at work.

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 1:29

Yeah, we were so busy, which was great.

SPEAKER_01 1:32

Yeah, awesome. Well, I sorry to say had a lovely relaxing Easter.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

Yeah, good on you. I still had eggs though.

SPEAKER_01 1:38

But a real highlight, as everyone in my life knows, because I haven't stopped bragging about it, was my birthday trip to Fitzroy Island the weekend before, and it was absolutely perfect. I spent quality time with family and friends, and by quality time I mean I forced them to snorkel with me for hours every single day for four days.

SPEAKER_00 1:53

Dragged, kicking, and screaming.

SPEAKER_01 1:55

We all had a great time. If you follow Word on the Reef social media, you would have seen all my videos from that trip of sharks, turtles, and the first time I've ever seen a burrowing sea cucumber.

SPEAKER_00 2:05

Really?

SPEAKER_01 2:06

I mean, I didn't even know what a burrowing sea cucumber was. I had to reverse Google image search. So, yeah, as the name suggests, the body is buried under the sand and the mouth has all these what look like tentacles that you see like the leopard one that has all the little white tentacles come out that it uses as a defense. Uh no, it's not a defensive thing. It was using them like arms to fetch. Just to grab its food. Yeah. It was really cool. I mean, I bet they're all over the place, but I haven't just never seen one before.

SPEAKER_00 2:33

Maybe that's half sea apple and half sea cucumber, because they're the same family. Because sea apples do that, don't they?

SPEAKER_01 2:38

Very echinoderm adjacent.

SPEAKER_00 2:40

Very echinoderm. Oh, look out, we're off.

unknown 2:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 2:43

Anyway, it's time to get into today's topics. So later in the show we'll be talking about Cyclone Norel, which hit the North Queensland coast on March 20th, left a trail of destruction stretching more than 6,000 kilometres from Cape York all the way across to Exmouth in Western Australia, impacting both communities and marine life. But first, we're tackling another big question. Just how in danger is the Great Barrier Reef? Because if you've been out on the reef recently like me, you'll know it's still breathtaking. It's full of life and colour and magical experiences like I just described. I just spent four days there for my birthday, and like I said, I didn't really want to leave. But at the same time, we know the reef is under serious pressure and its future is far from guaranteed. In fact, the UNESCO World Heritage Committee has repeatedly warned Australian governments to do more to protect the reef or risk it being placed on the World Heritage in Danger list. This would put Australia in the same category as war-torn developing countries like Afghanistan, the Congo and Yemen that are failing to protect their World Heritage sites. So, how much are the Australian and Queensland governments doing to protect the reef, and why is the UNESCO World Heritage Committee so concerned still? To help us unpack all of that, we're joined today by Dr. Lisa Schindler, Marine Ecologist and Great Barrier Reef campaign leader with the Australian Marine Conservation Society. Good morning, Dr. Schindler, and welcome to Word on the Reef. Hi, thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_00 4:08

Good morning. It's great to have you on.

SPEAKER_01 4:09

Yes, it's great to have you on the show.

Introducing Dr Lissa Schindler

SPEAKER_01 4:11

To start off, can you tell us a bit about yourself, your background, and how you came to be passionate about marine conservation and the reef? Sure.

SPEAKER_03 4:19

I grew up, I'm actually Victorian, so I grew up in Victoria, uh near Phillip Island, where the penguins are. And I learned to dive there, but then I did my first tropical dive in the Great Berry Reef when I was 20, and it was like this explosion of life. Anyone that's dived in Victoria would know that sometimes you can't see, you know, two metres in front of you. And so that really was what spurred my passion for coral reefs. And since then I've been really passionate about, you know, not just coral reefs themselves and understanding them more, but also, you know, the future because they are so vulnerable.

SPEAKER_00 5:00

Yeah, that's the connection that we get from everybody, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 5:03

Yeah, absolutely. And um I understand you've been working at AMCS or involved with AMCS for quite a long time and done quite a few campaigns.

SPEAKER_03 5:12

Yes, I have. I've been at AMCS for, well, 13 years now working on Great Barry Reef, and prior to that, um before I did my PhD, I worked in South East Queensland in boosting protection for Morton Bay Marine Park, which prior to the Marine Park rezoning, it was a 0.5% of high protection zones. Yeah, and how much was it after the campaign? It's gone up now to 16%. Uh so it was a significant increase and one that was really needed.

SPEAKER_01 5:41

Yeah, amazing. It's a beautiful place, uh Morton Bay.

World Heritage 'In Danger' Listing: What Does it Mean?

SPEAKER_01 5:44

Now let's talk about the reef's World Heritage status. When people hear that the Great Barrier Reef could be listed as World Heritage in danger, what does that actually mean?

SPEAKER_02 5:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:55

So the Great Barrier Reef was put on the World Heritage List in 1981 because of a whole range of really important values that the World Heritage Committee sees. And what they have though is they have a list where they put sites that they're concerned about. So sites that have risks that are not being managed properly. And so when we talk about the endanger list, that's really what we're discussing. And the Great Berry Reef has been under UNESCO's concern list probably for 10 years. It's not just climate change that they are concerned about, they're concerned about local issues like water pollution, um unsustainable fisheries, but climate is obviously one of the biggest drivers now because that's where we're seeing the biggest impact.

SPEAKER_02 6:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 6:40

Which other countries have sites on the World Heritage Endanger list? So a lot of countries that are on the endanger list are countries that are developing nations. There was Belize Coral Reefs were on the endanger list uh several years ago and they managed to address the threats that were facing it and now they came off it. Uh so the only real developed nation that is on the endanger list is the Everglades from Florida, and that was the government asked to put that on because of the water issues there.

What are UNESCO's Concerns?

SPEAKER_01 7:10

Yeah. The UNESCO World Heritage Committee, as you said, has been raising the alarm for years now about the Great Barrier Reef. What are their main concerns about the reef and what are the biggest threats that they're worried about?

SPEAKER_03 7:21

So the biggest concern has been climate change, obviously. It's you know, we've seen now there's been six mass bleaching events in the Great Barrier Reef in the last nine years and it's had varying impacts. 2024 was the worst, and we saw significant declines in coral cover in the south and in areas like Lizard Island, which is in the far north. The other issue though, like I said, is they're concerned about local threats. So the Great Barrier Reef is not just threatened by climate change. We've got a lot of the um catchments, so catchments are areas that drain, you know, when water comes in, it drains into the rivers and creeks and then out to the Great Barrier Reef waters. And a lot of those catchments have actually been converted into farming land. And that means that when you clear land, the soil comes off the farms and into the Great Barrier Reef, or also the cane farms where they apply too much fertilizer that then comes out and into the reef as well. So those are big concerns of UNESCO, and those have been going on for 10 years now, and we've really, you know, they're they're turning the dial a little bit in tackling this problem, but they've still got a long way to go to address things like water pollution. The other thing is uh is unsustainable fisheries. So right now, one of the biggest issues that UNESCO are looking at is are the fisheries in the Great Barrier Reef sustainable? They've already made a recommendation to Australia that they had to phase out gill nets, which Australia has done to their credit.

SPEAKER_02 8:48

Thank God.

SPEAKER_03 8:49

And now they're all loss also looking at the coral fishery.

The Coral Harvest Industry: Collecting and Exporting Corals

SPEAKER_03 8:52

So a lot of people may not know, but you know, you can still take live corals from the Great Barrier Reef and they get shipped overseas into people's aquariums. And when you think about a system that has had six mass bleaching events and is really under threat, like is that you know, does it pass the pub test anymore?

SPEAKER_01 9:08

Yeah, we know that aquariums can be for educational purposes, like where Brett works and they have a a limited amount of of coral and at least used to be doing a lot of restoration-related work with the um legacy startup project.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

So our guys still with our we have two live coral tanks that we grow ourselves, and that's where we also do a lot of study and everything on those corals as well, like stress testing and you know, they're on display, but there's a lot of work going on behind the scenes to make sure that they we understand more about them as well.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

So I think it it'd be great if there was a division between aquariums for for research purposes and restoration purposes, but at the moment that is the same permit that people are using just just for simply for commercial gain, right?

SPEAKER_00 9:51

Yeah, that's that's just not right. That has to change. But it's it's also having those corals on display is also uh from the education side of it. You know, if you have a thousand people come in there during the day that wouldn't know coral if it slapped them in the head and by the time they finish there they understand how it grows, what affects it, and how climate change is affecting it, and that's a massive positive for both sites.

SPEAKER_01 10:10

Yeah, that's really valuable, but Lisa, I understand there are hundreds of tons or is it 190 tons is the license right now. Yeah, every year, is it?

SPEAKER_03 10:20

It's not that they it's not to say that they take one hundred and ninety tons, but that's the allowable limit that they can take. And that never shifts even when there's a mass bleaching event.

SPEAKER_00 10:28

190 tons.

SPEAKER_01 10:30

Yeah, so so you mentioned there was a a mass bleaching event last year.

SPEAKER_00 10:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:37

So we're talking about 2024.

SPEAKER_03 10:39

2024, but there was a mass bleaching event in 2025 as well. It just wasn't a didn't have such a big impact that the twenty four one had.

SPEAKER_01 10:46

Yeah, it's it's that's the problem. They're all running into each other in my mind now because there's been so many things.

SPEAKER_00 10:51

I know, is that that amount that's allowable, is that in a specific area or is that it's a well, I mean, they have different areas that are targeted, but that's across the whole reef.

SPEAKER_01 11:01

It's the yellow zones and and and so not the green zones, which are the marine part protected areas, but there's various other zones. Um, for example, surprisingly, Fitzroy Island is yellow zone, so I don't know if any any businesses actually do take marine life from there, but it is allowed, I think, because it's a yellow zone. So yeah, interesting to know that up to 190 tons of coral are being exported and much of it isn't for research or education purposes, it's just for Joe Bloggs to put it in their living room.

SPEAKER_00 11:32

I think that a lot of listeners on this show in the last two minutes have probably spat their cup of coffee out. You know, it's it's it's it's not something that's common knowledge, but that's the facts.

SPEAKER_03 11:42

No, it's not common knowledge. And I guess the thing is that you know, as climate change is going to have an impact on the Great Barrier Reef, and as as it continues to do that, we need to look at well what can be done, everything that is impacting the Great Barrier Reef in any way, what can be shifted in that so that we give the Great Barrier Reef the best chance it has as temperatures increase.

SPEAKER_01 12:03

Yeah, that's right. I think in the past when the reef wasn't facing climate change and as much pollution as it is now, then taking a few four aquariums might have been considered a minor issue. But now we've got to try and do everything, we've got to address everything that we can.

SPEAKER_00 12:18

But there's there would be enough coral in major organisations, you know, that they wouldn't they shouldn't have if they know what they're doing properly and they already have that coral stock, they should be growing it themselves.

SPEAKER_03 12:30

There should be a point when they go yeah, that's the point. It's not to completely get the industry, it's to transition them out of taking live coral to put it into aquaculture.

SPEAKER_02 12:40

That's right.

SPEAKER_03 12:41

Because, you know, I mean, down the line, how we're seeing where the Great Berry Reef is headed, eventually this will become unsustainable and they won't be allowed to do it. And so let's step in now and help the industry transition before it's too late.

Is the Reef Still Great?

SPEAKER_01 12:56

So a lot of people, myself included, obviously can go out on the reef and see incredible beauty and marine life. I know I went out to the reef to Ellison Reef with you, Dr. Schindler, just last year and it was absolutely amazing and beautiful. Um, how do we reconcile that experience with the idea that the reef is under serious threat?

unknown 13:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 13:14

Yeah, so I mean, Allison Reef was a perfect example, is we went to three or four different sites, and one site that we went to had had quite a lot of damage. And then another site we went to, it was a mixture there, but there were like, you know, hundred-year-old coral boulders there. So the reef is really big, like it's two-thirds of the size of Queensland, and you are going to find pockets that have deteriorated more than others, and you will also find really beautiful places. And that said, I mean, I went snorkeling during the 2024 bleaching event. I was really devastated. But my kids were with me, and my son came out, and he had questions around the coral, but he also had seen a turtle and a shark, and he was just, you know, so excited to see that. So everyone's experience is different, and it is it is still a really beautiful place to go, but different areas are having different impacts, especially in those areas that are really closer to shore where water pollution affects them. Some of those have definitely deteriorated.

SPEAKER_00 14:16

And and that's an important message as well, isn't it? Like and I say this in my shows every day, for us to care about something, we have to understand it and fall in love with it, right? It brings that personal connection. So for those people who aren't lucky enough to work in the industry that we work in, it's important that they go out and look at it. It's important that they fall in love with it and understand it, right? And then that sparks that that change in people to go, do you know what? I did go out and the kids did see turtles, I did see sharks, they saw all these cool animals, and sit down with their kids and go, right, how do we look after this? Because that's the next generation. They're the ones that we need to get to to change this cycle that's been going on for too long.

SPEAKER_01 14:51

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 14:52

I would I would say that we shouldn't leave it to the next generation. I think we're putting a lot of pressure on the next generation to fix a lot of things that are going wrong now, and I think that we are the generation that need to start um.

SPEAKER_00 15:06

Yeah, well, we need to start it, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:08

Especially from a climate perspective. I mean, this is the window that we have to keep temperatures down as much as possible. Because by the time my son is, you know, he's 11 now, by the time he's 20, who knows what temperatures are going to be like in ten years' time. And so I think we really need to look to the next generation with hope, but not to fix our problems.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_01 15:29

Yeah, well, we need to look to them to inspire us to act for them.

SPEAKER_00 15:33

Yeah, which they're doing, which is really cool.

SPEAKER_03 15:35

Yeah, that's right. I mean, the um when they had those school kids who were protesting about climate and they did the big school strikes, that was the very first one they did was just after the Adani mine got its final approval. And so everyone was feeling really low, and then the next day this massive amount of young people came out. It was just so inspiring.

SPEAKER_00 15:54

Yeah, it was awesome.

Are Australian Govts Failing the Reef?

SPEAKER_01 15:55

So the Australian and Queensland governments often say they're investing billions into protecting the reef. What are they doing right? And where are they falling short on, you know, meeting those requirements that UNESCO has for protecting the reef?

SPEAKER_03 16:06

So they're falling short on climate commitments. UNESCO has asked Australia and Queensland to put their policies in line with limiting warming to 1.5 degrees. Neither the state or federal government have done that. We have these things that we call climate targets, and so it's what a country commits to in terms of reducing their carbon pollution. Australia's target that they released last year was not in line with limiting warming to 1.5 degrees. It was probably above two. And the new Queensland government has really just thrown the climate policy out. They're saying that they've still got it, but now they're not going to be looking at decarbonising the economy until at least 2030. And so that is definitely a big fail. Uh, you know, obviously Australia is doing more from the renewable space, but then on the other hand, they are approving, you know, big fossil fuel projects like offshore gas and and mines still happening. And, you know, those are the things that are driving climate change. And so they are really, in one sense, they're fueling the problem.

SPEAKER_01 17:10

Yeah, although Australia has a small population, we're one of the highest per person fossil fuel footprints in the world. And also a lot of people don't realise how big our footprint is if you include our exports. We're the second largest exporter of coal in the world. Instead of being such a small carbon footprint in the world, it brings us up to nearly 14% on some some figures I saw if we if you include the carbon emissions of all of our exports.

SPEAKER_03 17:35

Yeah, and and that's the point. And I think what's shown now with what's happening overseas and everything is that Australia has to just get off fossil fuels and start transitioning quickly, if not for the environment and the Great Barry Reef, for people's security. You know, we've seen what happens with these fossil fuel prices.

SPEAKER_00 17:54

Well, it's like a pretty obvious at the moment, isn't it? Yeah. Well, there's an easy way to fix that.

SPEAKER_01 18:01

Yeah, and apparently sales of uh electric vehicles have gone up 30% over that time because what matters most to people is what's going to end up being the cheapest. I know EVs haven't historically been the cheapest, but the the price is coming down and it's getting to the point where people are going to start selling their old ones and you'll be able to get a secondhand one. It's just that's the way mark you know products go when they start getting more common, I guess. So I would definitely look to that next time my current car packs it in, I would be looking at those options.

Political Avoidance Tactics

SPEAKER_01 18:30

Anyway, yeah, there has been a lot of political resistance to the reef being placed on the in danger list. Why is that?

SPEAKER_03 18:38

There is resistance from Australia to the point that they spend a lot of taxpayer dollars going and lobbying to keep it off the World Heritage in danger list. Instead of actually doing the actions. Instead of doing the actions. I mean, I will give the Australian government credit that they are doing some things. So I mentioned they've phased out the gillnets, they they are trying in the water quality space, but they've still got a long way to go. They recently invested $50 million into wetland restoration, and that is a really positive step, but obviously we need more and we need it at a larger scale. So wetlands are really the kidneys of the Great Barrier Reef. They filter water going out into the reef. So that's a really important part. Um, but it they see it as embarrassing. Like I said, there's developing nations are mostly on the endanger list, and those that don't have money to put towards management or war zones or things like that. That's what goes on the endanger list. And so, you know, for a developed nation who say that they've got the best managed reef in the world, that would be embarrassing to go on the endanger list.

SPEAKER_00 19:40

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 19:41

Majorly. Do you think if we were to get a listing, it can actually help a site to be on the endanger list. I mean, you said the government in America pushed the Aberglades to be on the endanger list. They wanted it on the endanger list for at least one of the governments, either state or federal, because they knew it would help drive attention to its plight and get more help for it. Isn't that right?

SPEAKER_03 20:02

The World Heritage Endanger list was never meant to be, you know, have a response like this. It was really brought in for international attention to go to sites that were struggling. And it has become quite a political hot potato in terms of just not wanting to get on that list. And it's not just Australia. We see, you know, going to the World Heritage Meetings, you see a lot of countries negotiating trying to get off this list. But yeah, it it's basically if the reef ever did go on the World Heritage Endanger list, they would be given a list of what they had to do management-wise to get off that

How to Avoid an 'In Danger' Listing

SPEAKER_03 20:38

list.

SPEAKER_01 20:39

What meaningful action could governments do right now to remove themselves from this possibility of an in-danger listing? Is there still do they still have time to do it? What's the timeline for when the World Heritage Committee will decide?

SPEAKER_03 20:52

So the World Heritage Committee will meet at the end of July, and that's when we'll find out. I think personally Australia has done enough to keep it at bay. The question really now is have they done enough to remove that international pressure altogether? And I would say no, they haven't. Last year they implemented stronger nature laws to stop tree clearing in reef catchments, which is a really positive step, but we need to see how that plays out on the ground and not just on paper. But there is still a lot more they can do, like we've talked about the coral fishery. We've also water pollution is the number one thing that they really need to tackle. Uh historically, water pollution was seen as something that was just impacting reefs and seagrass beds and things that, you know, are just near shore. Whereas now we're seeing when we have these increasing flood plumes and severe weather that these flood plumes are going a lot further than they used to.

SPEAKER_01 21:47

Yeah, well, a hundred kilometres or more offshore, and and that's because it's a combination with climate change, which is making rainfall events more severe. And then when there's more pollution in the water and it's going further out, it's it's uh it's not just impacting the seagrasses that are close to shore, but it's also making its way out quite far out onto reefs and impacting them as well. So we're seeing that now because we've just had such a big wet season, we're yet to see the the studies uh into the exact impacts of it's still not over by the look of it. No, definitely not. So are we at the point where we can still protect the reef as we know it, or are we now talking about saving parts of it or focusing and prioritizing on specific parts of it?

SPEAKER_03 22:28

You know, temperatures are going to keep increasing and we are going to see changes still happening with the Great Barrow Reef, and we are It's really horrible to to say, but we are going to see parts of the reef no longer there in the future. But there are parts, you know, the Great Barrier Reef is so big and there are still so many things that can be done. Even, you know, when you take climate change out of the equation in terms of Australia's role, all those local threats need to be, any lever Australia has to pull in addressing any other threat to the Great Barrier Reef needs to be pulled. And that's addressing water pollution, sustainable fisheries. All those kind of issues, because we need to now give the reef the best chance it has to come up against climate change. And you know, it's depressing we will see changes, but there is still hope, especially if you're really protecting those areas, the replenishment sites that feed those other reefs.

SPEAKER_01 23:26

Yeah, there will never be a point where we can give up because there's a lot of stages in between pristine and debt. There's all these different stages in between, and how much we do determines how much we get to save. I mean, every fraction of a degree of warming that we stop could be a few more species or a little bit more that we save. So there's there's never a point where we can say, well, we haven't managed to prevent everything completely, so what's the point? That's not a valid attitude, I suppose, because there's always a point as long as there's still some some more things we can do to save some more of it, I suppose, is how I look at it. So I'm going to be fighting to s protect it until there's only three corals left. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:09

Well, they deserve it.

SPEAKER_01 24:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 24:10

And there's 3,000 reefs in the Great Burgery. So I think sometimes people just think of like one coral system, but it's it's huge, and there's 3,000 reefs, and there's still a lot of healthy coral left.

SPEAKER_00 24:22

Bigger than Japan.

SPEAKER_01 24:23

Bigger than New Zealand as well. So for listeners who love the reef, what do you recommend that individuals and communities can do that makes a difference to help with this situation?

SPEAKER_03 24:33

Look, the biggest thing that you can do is to, you know, get to know your local MP. The the reality is that it comes down to politics and this, you know, whether the reef is there or not in the future is really a political decision because there's lots of, like I've said, levers that they can pull to reduce threats to the Great Barrier Reef and do more on climate change. But you know, you can follow Fight for Our Reef, which is our AMCS campaign, and just you know, get involved, go out and visit the reef if you can, if you can't, then there's lots of different ways that you can connect with the reef and and people and just start talking about it again. And I think one of my biggest things for people is to not give up. I think sometimes when we see all the bleaching events and it seems really doom and gloom that there's no future for it, is it there actually is. It's just the future is only there if we keep hope for it.

SPEAKER_01 25:28

Yeah, and we need numbers. So every single person out there, you you matter because when we all come together in numbers, we make we've I understand that Flight Rail Reef has made huge differences to the reef throughout its history, saving the Great Bay Reef from oil drilling, uh limestone mining, which was all sort of started at Ellison Reef, where I got to snorkel with you last year, saving the m many parts of the reef from capital dredging and coal port expansion. So and it was only achieved because there was thousands and tens of thousands of ordinary reef lovers. So any listeners out there that that want to know what you can do, definitely follow fightforourreef.org.au, check out the website, sign up for updates, and you'll learn up be able to learn a lot more about how you can get involved, sign some of their petitions, take some actions. And yeah,

Kids & What Gives You Hope?

SPEAKER_01 26:17

Lisa, like I've said, we got to go on a snorkeling trip to Ellison Reef last year. We were doing some reef surveying, and it was really cute seeing how excited your young kids were about snorkeling. And like you said, they're just getting to an age where they can start to really learn about the reef. How does that impact your perspective on the urgency of protecting the reef and your feelings around it?

SPEAKER_03 26:37

Yeah, it's a big driver for me, and I think like many parents, you want your kids to get the same experiences that you have had. And so it was really special, especially my son, he's 11 now, so he's actually starting to learn the fish and get a better understanding. Whereas that snorkeling trip, um, my six-year-old, that was the first time she'd put her face in the water. Um, we'd been on a couple of other trips and she had been too scared, but she'd seen stuff with glass bottom boats and things, but yeah, so it was a really special trip, and she was really excited, and you know, it's a big driving force for me because I I want my kids to have a great barrier reef in the future. I want them to be able to take their kids out. You know, this is something that's really special that we have in Australia, and I want my kids to have that in their future.

SPEAKER_01 27:24

Yeah, absolutely. And anyone who's, you know, a childborn today and has to wait six more years until they might be confident enough to put their face in the water, what's going to be there for them? That's what we're that's what we need to be fighting to protect. And so, with all that in mind, what gives you hope, Dr. Schindler, when it comes to the future of the Great Barrier Reef?

SPEAKER_03 27:45

Well, I have hope because there is hope. There is we there is still a lot of things that we can do, even though temperatures are increasing in the climate sphere, it still can be, like you said, every degree of warming matters. And right now we haven't reached that critical point yet. So obviously, climate is a big thing and there's lots happening, but we need to do more. But also those local threats is that there's a lot of things that the government can be doing to tackle those local threats to the Great Barry Reef to give it a better fighting chance.

SPEAKER_01 28:16

Dr. Schindler, we'd love to chat long with you, but I understand you've got a very full schedule of meeting with decision makers, talking about the importance of protecting the reef and keeping it off the endanger list. So we've got to let you go. But thank you so much for joining us on the show today. Thanks for having me. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 28:31

It's been really nice to meet you. Have a great stay and try not to work too hard.

SPEAKER_01 28:34

Yeah, you're you're an inspiration. It's been great chatting with you. Thanks for all your amazing work. Thanks, guys.

The Nightmare of Cyclone Narelle

SPEAKER_01 28:44

Good morning everyone, and welcome back to Word on the Reef. For this second half of the show, it's time for a reef health update because, wow, there is a lot going on right now. There is. We've had marine heat waves, cyclone Norel, and now another cyclone potentially on the way. So I thought I'd take some time to unpack it all. So let's start by going back to Cyclone Norel. This system was an absolute monster. Yeah. Traveling more than 6,000 kilometres and making landfall three times. It first hit Cape York near Cohen on March 20th as a category four. Then it crossed the Gulf of Carpentaria, re-intensified, and hit the Northern Territory coast as a category three. And then, incredibly, it strengthened again off the coast of Western Australia before making a third landfall near the tourist town of Coral Bay, uh just over 1200 kilometres north of Perth as a category four. And across all of those regions, communities have been hit hard with extreme winds, major flooding, and widespread damage to homes, businesses, and farms. But the impact in Western Australia appears to have been especially severe. Have you seen any of the articles or imagery from Western Australia?

SPEAKER_00 29:57

Yeah, I have.

SPEAKER_01 30:27

Yeah, well, that's where my parents lived and uh went straight over there. They had to cancel the annual agricultural show because of a cyc a cyclone 300 kilometres inland. But it it had petered out to a tropical low by the time it got there.

SPEAKER_00 30:41

But it did some damage up north.

SPEAKER_01 30:43

I'm surprised it's not the longest distance of a cyclone ever travelled, but there was one a while ago that did almost did a John Farnum tour of Australia.

SPEAKER_00 30:52

All way round. Almost, yeah. But I've I've never seen one end up on the south coast of Western Australia, even as a tropical low. I mean that the heart of it was still there. That was just madness.

SPEAKER_01 31:04

Yeah. Well, heading back to my parents' house in the bush was my climate escape plan, but maybe they're not out of the park.

SPEAKER_00 31:11

Nowhere's

Narelle's Impacts on Ningaloo Reef

SPEAKER_00 31:12

safe now.

SPEAKER_01 31:13

Yeah, so uh it was particularly devastating to Exmouth and Coral Bay, which of course are quite far north of Perth. And had an impact on marine life, of course. That stretch of coast is home to Ningaloo Reef, a world heritage listed ecosystem, famous for its biodiversity and tourism. And in the aftermath of the cyclone, beaches there were turned into graveyards of marine life. Dolphins, seabirds, sea snakes, greef fish, all washed up along the shore, absolutely devastating scenes. And unfortunately, this is Ningaloo Reef that was hit by a severe bleaching. Um the year before, I think it was last year, because they're all all the years are running into each other.

SPEAKER_00 31:54

Yeah, they are.

SPEAKER_01 31:55

So it's still trying to recover from that.

SPEAKER_00 31:57

That was the first time Ningaloo and the GBR of Great Barrier Reef bleached exactly. That was yeah, last year.

SPEAKER_01 32:03

Last year, yeah. And uh also uh Ningaloo Reef actually was in the middle of its spawning period. So that's something interesting about the West Coast is the corals spawn at a different time of year to the Great Barrier Reef where we have spawning in November, December. Well, they were in the middle of their spawning period when this cyclone hit, which is gonna make a real impact to those corals' ability to that they were trying to spawn and regenerate.

SPEAKER_00 32:28

So those little babies that had just been laid and then a giant storm comes along and messes it all up.

SPEAKER_01 32:35

Yeah, but of course there is hope. It's still a place of incredible beauty and resilience, as some divers and and tourism operators have been posting about. There's still a lot out there. Obviously, not all of the marine life was impacted, and there's a lot there to recover if we give it a chance, I suppose.

SPEAKER_00 32:51

Yeah, that's right. But there's also the impact of that amount of water landing inland as well. I got sent a f uh video of all I saw was just this raging torrent of water, and then it zoomed back and it was Uluru. Okay, with a giant waterfall coming off the side of Uluru. Like the amount of rainfall that ended up through central Australia was just insane. But I I know that on average in the Gulf Savannah, so we've three in the world, India, Africa, and our big giant one, the Gulf Savannah, it's bigger than uh New South Wales, about 186,000 square kilometers. They get 50,000 Sydney harbours of rainfall out there every year. Like you just can't imagine it. Then you add this onto it too. I've seen we watch that footage of that the Mitchell River and the Mulgrave and everything, it's just insane.

SPEAKER_01 33:39

Yeah, it definitely brought a lot of rain, and that also will have a flow and impact. So it's not just those big waves washing the animals up on the beach, but it's the after effects of all the sediment and pollution. Yeah, so Ningaloo Reef, still on my list to go back and snorkel and dive, amazing place, but devastating events like this are very sad, and it's a stark reminder for the need for climate action because we know that cyclones are obviously a natural occurrence, but they're getting we're getting more severe cyclones as a result of climate change. So to put that in perspective, over the past 20 years in Queensland we've had uh 15 severe cyclones, that's category three, four, and five, compared to only eight in the 20 years before that. So almost double the amount of severe cyclones.

SPEAKER_00 34:29

Well, I I experienced the edge of Larry and Yassi that were the Cat Fives. My late brother was working in Mission Beach as a chef, and he decided to stay in my place in White Rock because he was working on a resort that's right at the top of the hill at Mission Beach that overlooked Dunk Island. And thank goodness that he stayed with me because we went down the next day. It took us four hours to get from the highway to Mission Beach after Yassi went through. It just leveled everything. Wow. Yeah, but there was nothing left of the resort when we got there.

SPEAKER_01 34:57

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 34:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:59

Devastating systems.

Narelle's Impacts on the Far Northern GBR

SPEAKER_01 35:00

Now, what impacts did Cyclone Narrell have here on the Great Barrier Reef? Cyclone Rail hit the far northern section of the reef, about 600 kilometres north of Cairns. And because it's such a remote area, we don't yet have a clear, comprehensive scientific picture of the damage. I've reached out to Lizard Island Research Station, so hopefully we'll get one of them on for some more detailed insights about exactly what impact this cyclone had on the far northern reef in a future show. Um what we are hearing though is that the impacts have been extensive but variable. I spoke to a diver who was out on the far northern and coral sea reefs just after the cyclone. Yep. And she said some sites were absolutely hammered and while others were surprisingly okay. So it really comes down to the what level of exposure they had and what direction the the waves were coming from. So the cyclone was north of Lizard Island, for example. Yep. It was to the north of a lot of the ribbon reefs, I think. And so the waves were coming from the north direction and hitting hitting the reefs on the northern side. And so we know that the windward side of any reef would have been the one to take the full force of waves and surge, and while the leeward, more sheltered side partially protected.

SPEAKER_00 36:17

Yeah, it's kind of the because as you know, you've been out there as long as I have, that when we get um northerlies, then we'd always dive on the opposite side, which would normally be the windward side and then swap. So it's a shame that those cyclones are going north and attacking the sides that we would mostly go to on a daily basis diving as well. Yeah. So if it went well f well north of Osprey, then even Osprey Reef, which is like 600 K's north, would have been even further north than that, wouldn't it? It's right up to Cape York it hit, didn't it?

SPEAKER_01 36:46

Uh it by the time it got to the coast, it was near Cullen. I think it did have some impact on those Osprey Reef areas, but it's also the depth, so it's it's the shallowest corals within the first sort of six metres that are most impacted by those waves on the surface. Whereas those coral sea they're very deep. Even the tops like at low tide can still be five or six metres or yeah, they're quite deep, and uh mainly when people go there, it's not for snorkeling, it's for diving. So the depth means that all the deeper corals on these reefs were better spared. Yeah. And so it's obviously a mixed bag, and it's still, you know, if anyone said to me, Hey, do you want a trip to Steve's Bombie tomorrow, I'd be there in a blink of an eye.

SPEAKER_00 37:28

I I would literally have one foot out the door. Steve's Bombie is one of my I think the worst thing about Steve's Bombie is that we're not fish. That the coming up and having a swap tanks thing.

SPEAKER_01 37:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:41

It's just if anyone out there that's listening that's been in the dive industry and has dive Steve's bomby, it is it's heaven on earth. Yeah. It's just incredible. It's like almost like the Ritz Carlton for fish. They all want to hang out there and have their holidays out there. It's just beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 37:56

Yeah, is that is that where you're going when you go towards the light at the end of the Yeah, just chuck me off the back.

SPEAKER_00 38:02

Either Osprey or Steve's.

SPEAKER_01 38:04

Yeah, I mean, it'll be heaven. You'll come back as a fish. I'm gonna come back as a shark. And you're gonna be hanging out at Steve's. I will be.

SPEAKER_00 38:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:11

Okay, so variable impacts observed by divers in those regions, but we'll bring some more uh sort of scientific survey data as they come to light. But another factor is that that far northern region and the region near Cairns had already been experiencing bleaching before the cyclone, driven by above average sea surface temperatures. And it's these above average sea surface temperatures which drive bleaching, but also the formation of more intense cyclones. So, you know, we're we're in April and there's several places across Queensland that have experienced their hottest April dates on record. So we're still well above average. The sea surface temperatures are at record high, as of course there's going to be heat waves and and cyclones. It's just it's climate change.

SPEAKER_00 38:56

It's a double-edged sword, isn't it? Yeah. Even if we look back like we need to have a look at some data, this is something else that we need to write down and talk about another time. But we just seem to be getting deeper into April and then May, and these things are still flipping around out there and flopping around in the ocean. Just you know, they it's so obvious they're just getting later and later in the year.

SPEAKER_01 39:15

Yeah, the wet season goes for longer.

SPEAKER_00 39:17

Yeah, before November hit, we'd be like, Right, let's go and grab our baked beans and two tons of toilet paper. We're not doing that till January now.

SPEAKER_01 39:23

Hmm. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:24

You know, it's just everything's changed.

SPEAKER_01 39:26

Yeah, well you've been in Cairns even longer than me. I've been here for about 15 years, and you've been here longer, so you would remember the changes even more.

SPEAKER_00 39:34

Yeah, it's so it's obvious.

SPEAKER_01 39:35

Yeah, so we've got the wave action has had an impact. There's been bleaching from heat waves, but also heavy rainfall and flooding, and those flood plumes would be washing sediment and pollution and reducing the the salt content of the water, which all of which adds stress and can cause bleaching. So there's multiple, multiple impacts, and it obviously takes months before enough scientific surveys can be done to ascertain the full impacts of such things.

SPEAKER_00 40:05

But yeah, that was remember um what was the one that dumped not that long ago? Jasper. Jasper, the mongrel. A couple of years ago. Yeah, that a couple of years ago. That's when they found the solidity level dropped in the closer reefs and caused awful, awful deaths of our fish and etcetera. Yeah. But people can who have been following our show, which will be everybody, when we talk about these cyclones now and the effects that they have, and if you go back and you think about the p the amazing guests that we've had on the show talking about fixing the the sides of our rivers and streams and that flow-on effect, and you can see that connection. It's just everything needs to be working in sync.

SPEAKER_01 40:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:41

But it's sort of just getting to the point now where it's just um it's just overwhelming.

SPEAKER_01 40:46

Yeah, we've definitely upset the balance of nature and and she's getting No wonder she's cranky. Getting cranky because of of what humans have done, I guess.

Narelle's Impacts on Reefs Near Cairns

SPEAKER_01 40:54

But did Cyclone Norrell have any impact on Cairns and our section of the reef all the way down here? Uh, we are about 600 kilometres south of where Cyclone Norrell made landfall near Cohen, but we still felt the impact. It's a huge footprint of such a cyclone. So anyone uh who's seen the images online of the people surfing at Kawara Beach? I know.

SPEAKER_02 41:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:16

It's I mean that that's fun, but it's it's not normally possible because the Great Barrier Reef blocks all of the swell from the open ocean. So it's normally as calm as a mirror or close to inside the Great Barrier Reef. So to see people surfing gives you an idea of how far those big waves were travelling. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:33

I always giggle when I see backpackers turn up in their vans and they've got four surfboards on the roof. So what are you going to use those for, mate? A dinner table. There's no surf up here unless there's a cyclone.

SPEAKER_01 41:43

So those big surf waves did damage though. Uh a lot of expensive damage to the uh northern beaches of Cairns foreshores, for example, Holloway's beach, people would have seen the images. All those people with their houses along the Esplanade are now several metres closer to beachfront.

SPEAKER_00 41:59

Yeah, so the value's gone up for now, but it doesn't want to get any closer, it'll go backwards. But I mean they were still they're still recovering from Jasper too. Uh-huh. You know, all that area there that got wiped out.

SPEAKER_02 42:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:09

The devastation down there, those poor people at the northern beaches. So I'm I I know of people personally that still haven't had their kitchen replaced or or things aren't fixed because it's just it's it was just a huge, huge issue. I was lucky because I dodged a bullet because I lived at Yorkeys for six years, and I'd only just recently moved into town and um yeah, Yorkes got hit hard.

SPEAKER_01 42:31

Yeah, they're still recovering from cycling jasper, and uh, although this one wasn't a direct hit, it didn't flood those communities, they've seen a lot of coastal erosion. So I went for a walk down there afterwards, and basically the lifeguard hut, which is you know meant to be near the beach, it actually got eroded underneath and all the earth got washed away underneath it, so it fell into the ocean, had to be removed. There's a path, like a cycle path, a walking path, which has been completely eroded underneath, so it's like a concrete catwalk just hanging in the air with no sand underneath, it all got washed out. And then there's that cafe straight on the beach, it's called, which is, you know, obviously the name is appropriate because it is very close to the beach, but now it's even closer. Um it's fine, it's fine though, that cafe is still amazing because they I think they have rocks and plants that sort of protected it. But even though Council over the years has put a lot of rocks in the water, like on that waterfront to try and prevent coastal erosion, unfortunately a lot of giant waves were were more than than those rocks could contend with, I guess.

SPEAKER_00 43:30

It's changed the name to the restaurant to literally on the beach now.

SPEAKER_01 43:33

Yeah, well, someone I don't know if it was the people who actually own it or some cheeky bystander, but they've um changed the sign at the top of the restaurant where it says straight on the beach, and they changed it to straight in the beach.

SPEAKER_00 43:45

Oh, right. Yeah, good old North Queensland humility.

SPEAKER_01 43:49

Yeah, at least they can have a sense of humour about it, right?

SPEAKER_00 43:51

Yeah, that's right.

SPEAKER_01 43:52

Prime beach front location. Anyway, when you see what that kind of wave energy does to our coastline, it's no surprise it also impacts our nearby reefs. But talking about the reefs near Cairns, a quick note about bleaching in our Cairns region. The Great Barry Reef Marine Park Authority released a reef health update yesterday confirming significant coral bleaching on reefs near Cairns, driven by high sea surface temperatures and flood plumes, of course. And sadly, this bleaching is really very far from being a news headline because there's so much else going on. So it hasn't really made the news the fact that there's also been heat related bleaching and flood related bleaching on the reef, because unfortunately. Unfortunately, bleaching is becoming so frequent and so routine that it's obviously no longer considered news. I mean, there was bleaching every year now for the last three years, and and and the bleaching that we're seeing now is not severe enough or widespread enough to be announced as a mass bleaching event. But it's still sad to see.

SPEAKER_02 44:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:54

And it's not it's not normal before, you know, the last decade. It wasn't normal to see bleaching like this every single year. And it's a clear signal that we need urgent action on climate change. But then on top of bleaching, we now have Cyclone Norel, 600 kilometres to our north. And according to the Reef Authority, all reefs surveyed in the Cairns region, which they call the northern region, showed severe coral damage likely caused by cyclone Norel.

SPEAKER_00 45:21

Oh, Norrell.

SPEAKER_01 45:22

So think about that. We're 600 kilometres away from where that cyclone hit, and we're still seeing the impacts significantly around Cairns. That's the footprint of a category five, which it was before it hit the mainland. And I have friends that work out on various different reefs off of Cairns and have seen these impacts and confirmed that. And I actually saw it myself when I was at Fitzroy Island for my birthday. We did four days of hours of snorkeling every day. And some sites, especially as we just mentioned, on the windward side, the exposed side, were heavily impacted. I did see the impacts from that wave action and from that distant cyclone. But it's important to note that others on the leeward side were relatively sheltered and not impacted. So as I've mentioned several times, still had an amazing birthday snorkeling on that protected side of the island, sharks, turtles, the uh burrowing sea cucumber. It was an absolutely amazing place.

SPEAKER_00 46:18

Yeah, um one of my staff members was snorkeling at Fitzroy the other day, and there were nine turtles in her area. There's lots of extra. Did you see a lot of seagrass out there?

SPEAKER_01 46:26

Yeah, the algae has bloomed.

SPEAKER_00 46:29

Yeah, big time. Yeah, and the turtles are loving it. They're all like packed in there. She saw nine sea turtles, two octopus.

SPEAKER_01 46:35

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 46:36

Obviously, our mates, the white tips and black tips sharks, are still out there having a bit of a player.

SPEAKER_01 46:40

It's honestly one of my favourite places in the world. It's so incredible.

SPEAKER_00 46:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:43

I would go there again the next opportunity that I have, and I highly recommend everyone else does as well. But on a exposed part of Fitzroy, I did see the impacts of this cyclone. And the impacts were that all the branching corals were broken into rubble.

SPEAKER_02 46:59

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 47:00

And one thing that really got me, which was really hard to see, was that all the soft corals had been reduced to rotting tissues washing up dead on the beach.

SPEAKER_00 47:07

Oh, that's heartbroken.

SPEAKER_01 47:08

And a lot of them were just lying rotting on the seafloor, yeah, just deteriorating away. And uh also I did see bleaching. Some of the corals were not bleached, some of them were. It's always patchy depending on the depth and the species, but I did see bleached corals and anemones, which would have been either due to the heat stress prior to the cyclone or due to the runoff the flood waters and pollution.

SPEAKER_00 47:33

Yeah, that's a that really has an impact on us when we see those anemones bright white.

SPEAKER_01 47:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:38

Like that. It's just awful.

SPEAKER_01 47:39

And I got a bunch of footage to show the contrast. There's healthy images, there's bleached images, and I put a bunch of them on Word on the Reef social media for anyone who wants to see that sort of mixed bag.

SPEAKER_02 47:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:50

And we know that reefs can recover from cyclone damage, but it does take time. It can take 10 to 15 years for a full recovery. And so that just again highlights how important it is to take action to prevent these disasters from getting worse.

SPEAKER_00 48:06

Yeah, I mean, you know, she's been around a long time and she's been pretty tough till we turned up. Now we're just compounding the problem. You know, we we're two steps forward, three back. We just need to even it

Cyclone Maila on the Way

SPEAKER_00 48:16

out.

SPEAKER_01 48:16

So, anyway, there's only two minutes left. So I'd say that's a wrap on the wild weather impacts our marine life has endured over the past few weeks, but sadly it's not over yet because many of our local listeners will know there is now another system. Cyclone Mylar has formed in the Coral Sea and is forecast to potentially cross Cape York early next week on a very similar path to Norell. We think it's not quite as strong as Norell, but it's still too early to know exactly where it will hit or how strong it will be at landfall. So we'll just keep watching her closely and hoping it doesn't bring another round of devastation.

SPEAKER_00 48:49

Yeah, she can just fizzle out and disappear. That's what she needs to do.

SPEAKER_01 48:52

Yeah, she can just fizzle right off.

SPEAKER_00 48:53

Yeah, you're you're not. Is that a female's name or what is it? Milo. Milo. Oh Milo. Milo would be a pretty good name for a cyclone, wouldn't it? Maybe next time you can Milo.

SPEAKER_01 49:05

That's all we have time for today. Thanks to you, all our listeners, for joining us on Word on the Reef with me, Tanya Murphy, and co-host Brett Goodband. This show is broadcast live from the Kans FM studio, which is on the land of the Dingy people. We'd like to extend our respect to elders past and present. We'll be back next week with more marine science adventures. 10am every Friday on Cans FM 89.1. And don't forget to follow us on Instagram at Instagram.com slash word on the reef podcast. That's all for this week. Yup