Massive reef found hiding just behind the Great Barrier Reef
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Sydney - A large trove of raw data collected by the Australian Navy has helped scientists to discover a massive reef behind the Great Barrier Reef, one of the scientists said Tuesday.
"For decades, we knew about the existence of these geological structures in the northern Great Barrier Reef, but we have never had more information," said Robin Beaman, a professor at James Cook University leading the research that found the reef.
"We did not know their shape, nor the enormity of their size."
"What we found deep behind the Great Barrier Reef has amazed us. It's the deeper part of the seafloor, the inter-reef and the strange shape of the geological structure that has grabbed us," he told dpa.
"These are vast meadows of green algae covering the inter-reef seafloor, and more than 10,000 years of growth, building up into these weird-looking Halimeda bioherms."
Halimeda bioherms are large reef-like structures in the shape of honeycombs and donuts formed by the growth of calcareous green algae accumulated over time as sediments from small limestone, or calcium carbonate, flakes that die and build up to form large mounds.
They are found at a depth between 20 and 40 metres, which is lower than a coral reef.
"If you go scuba diving, you won't know how deep they are or how large they are because most of the time you don't go below 20metres," Beaman said.
"We reprocessed the data by the Australian Navy, who conducted the survey of the sea floor using Lidar technology," Beaman said.
Lidar is a surveying method using technology that maps a surface by illuminating the target with a laser light to produce high-resolution mapping of the area.
- AFP
