On a recent sashay dubbedDeep Search 2018 , a group of ocean investigator discovered 85 miles of deep - sea red coral reef off the coast of the southeastern US .
" Good news is too rare these twenty-four hours , and this is a victory that we can all divvy up . We have found a pristine coral Witwatersrand in our own backyard , " Erik Cordes , the principal scientist on the excursion and a deep - ocean ecologist at Temple University , wrote in a mission summary .
Deep Search 2018 , which took place from August 19 to September 2 , was a collaborative project between the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ( NOAA ) , the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management , and the US Geological Survey . The goal of the dispatch was to research — and safeguard — the little - understood home ground lurking off the US ’s populated East Coast . To accumulate fresh data about these deep - weewee habitat , scientists used a research ship call off Atlantis from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution .
" We finish 11 honkytonk in the human occupy vehicle ( HOV ) Alvin in the muddy parts of canyons , arresting drop faces , bubbling accelerator pedal seeps , and massive deep - ocean coral reefs , " Cordes wrote . " The information we have gathered will help us to understand these habitats and their moral force . "
But by far the biggest outcome of the mission , he said , was the find of the previously unnamed reef . Cordes and expedition members first spotted the Rand during an eight - minute prima donna on August 23 . television camera on the submergible Alvin captured live corals roost on with child mounds of dead coral , indicating that this community has been thriving for 100 .
The 85 - land mile Rand is located off the seashore of Georgia and South Carolina , just about 160 mile east of Charleston . The corals were mostlyLophelia , a miscellany of mystifying - sea corals that grow in cold , Atlantic waters . Along withLophelia , the team brought back samples of other coral varieties as well , let in octocorals .
" Many phallus of the Deep Search team will spend the fare month and years in full characterizing the significance of our August 23 nosedive , which revealed extensive , previously unconfirmedLopheliareefs , " the researchers wrote in ablog postfollowing the discovery .
scientist knew from past research carried out by NOAA that deep - ocean coral mounds existed in these urine , but they had never viewed the reefs firsthand .
The Deep Search squad created a three - instant time - lapse television of the eight - hour dive in which they discovered the coral reef . you’re able to watch the footage here .
Researchers will utilise the samples they pull together to well understand these teeming deep - sea communities . cord toldHuffPostthe reef provides important habitat for a number of fish and coral mintage .
But President Donald Trump ’s Administration has propose rolling back banning on seaward crude boring in the Atlantic , which could potentially impact this Witwatersrand , according to a paper fromThe Atlanta Journal - Constitution .
Read next on Business Insider : Up to 50 % of the world ’s coral has give-up the ghost , but scientists are figuring out how to regrow Reef — here ’s what the process looks like
