Tuesday, July 21, 2026
Science

Underwater drones discover coral reefs off Benin, long presumed dead, teeming with life

A coral reef, missing and presumed dead, has been found alive and well off the coast of Benin. Surveys in the 1960s, focused on identifying promising fishing areas, flagged a possible deep-water coral reef but assumed it must be dead. Now, using a modern sonar survey and the Deep Sea Camera System p...

Underwater drones discover coral reefs off Benin, long presumed dead, teeming with life
Image: Phys.org
A coral reef, missing and presumed dead, has been found alive and well off the coast of Benin. Surveys in the 1960s, focused on identifying promising fishing areas, flagged a possible deep-water coral reef but assumed it must be dead. Now, using a modern sonar survey and the Deep Sea Camera System provided by the National Geographic Exploration Technology Lab, scientists have found an apparently healthy reef.

Originally published at Phys.org

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