Hakai Magazine: The wave of destruction started in October 2014. As the shallow water surrounding the Hawai?ian Islands warmed, fueled by El Nio, the coral began to blanch. Once a kaleidoscope of color, the coral reef in Kane?ohe Bay, on the northeast coast of O?ahu, faded to a skeletal white. It was like watching a train wreck in slow motion, says Mary Hagedorn, a marine biologist with the Smithsonian Institution. It was really awful to see.
When coral are bleached by warm water, the algae that live within...