Coral mortality induced by the 2015–2016 El-Niño in Indonesia:  the effect of rapid sea level fall

Ampou, Eghbert Elvan; Johan, Ofri; Menkes, Christophe E.; Niño, Fernando; Birol, Florence; Ouillon, Sylvain; Andréfouët, Serge

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-817-2017

Articles | Volume 14, issue 4

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-817-2017

© Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-817-2017

© Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 14, issue 4

Research article

|

24 Feb 2017

Research article |

| 24 Feb 2017

Coral mortality induced by the 2015–2016 El-Niño in Indonesia: the effect of rapid sea level fall

Eghbert Elvan Ampou, Ofri Johan, Christophe E. Menkes, Fernando Niño, Florence Birol, Sylvain Ouillon, and Serge Andréfouët

Data sets

Altimetry data AVISO http://www.aviso.altimetry.fr/en/data.html

Sea level measured by tide gauges from global oceans - the Joint Archive for Sea Level holdings (NCEI Accession 0019568), Version 5.5, NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information P. C. Caldwell, M. A. Merrfield, and P. R. Thompson https://doi.org/10.7289/V5V40S7W

Short summary

The 2015–2016 El Niño was the strongest on record and has generated significant coral bleaching and mortality worldwide. In Indonesia, first signs of bleaching were reported in April 2016. However, we show that this El Niño has impacted Indonesian reefs since 2015 through a different process than temperature-induced bleaching. Another El Niño-induced process, sea level fall, is responsible for significant coral mortality on North Sulawesi shallow reefs, and probably throughout Indonesia.