Milestone Moment as Four Seasons Resorts Maldives Plant 9000th Coral Frame
One of the most successful coral restoration projects of its kind in the world, the reef regeneration efforts at Four Seasons Resorts Maldives were born in the wake of the 1997-1998 El Nino bleaching event. Coastal oceanographer Thomas Le Berre of Seamarc Pvt. – now Reefscapers – approached the then new-to-the-Maldives Four Seasons with his dreams of coral propagation. A visionary partnership was born, leading to one of the Indian Ocean's largest masses of artificial reefs to date covering 3.05 acres (2,351 square metres).
Supported by Four Seasons, Thomas's research led to the development of a revolutionary coral frame technique. Now adopted by conservationists worldwide, it involves attaching small coral fragments onto metal frames that are then planted on the seabed to regenerate coral reefs.
Like the coral it supports, the project has grown in myriad ways over the years. The coral propagation success at Four Seasons Resorts Maldives at Landaa Giraavaru and Kuda Huraa led to Marine Discovery Centres at both Resorts served by a team of 11 full-time marine biologists. Marine conservation projects there include coral spawning research, sea turtle rehabilitation, and a Fish Lab to breed ornamental reef fish in captivity, reducing pressures on the natural reef. Landaa also became the birthplace of The Manta Trust – now a global charity dedicated to the worldwide protection of manta rays.
Reefscapers and Four Seasons continue to evolve reef restoration. Resort guests at Four Seasons two resort islands as well as Four Seasons Private Island at Voavah can transplant their own reef and watch it grow via online photo updates. In 2020, the onsite development of an AI catamaran that uses robotics to improve monitoring efforts led to the publication of the world's largest coral restoration study to date in peer-reviewed journal Nature Ecology & Evolution, using Artificial Intelligence to assess, analyse and record data.
Climate change poses a huge threat to a country reliant on coral reefs. In 2016, the teams were devastated when 90 percent of the shallow water corals in Baa died in a bleaching event. When a mass bleaching event was predicted in 2024, the onsite Reefscapers teams were able to take preventative action, relocating an incredible 28,000 corals – between 450 and 500 frames – from shallow 2-3 metre sites to depths of 6-12 metres in a bid to save them.
On nearby island Fulhadhoo, building the coral frames supports the local economy. The frames are made from metal rebars and coated in a special mix of sand and resin to protect them from corrosion. Fragments of Acropora corals – collected from local healthy mature colonies – are attached securely before the frame is labelled, planted in the reef and photographed for monitoring purposes.
'Our 9,000th coral frame is an uplifting milestone for us,' comments Armando Kraenzlin, Regional Vice President and General Manager at Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru. 'The Reefscapers teams at Four Seasons Resorts Maldives are all inspired by a shared love for the ocean and a determination to protect it from harm caused by human actions. As the restoration sites grow, we are seeing significant growth in the numbers of smaller species that live in and around the coral. This in turn attracts larger animals including sharks, eagle rays and turtles around the sites – restoring hope with every frame.'
The Reefscapers teams at Landaa Giraavaru, Kuda Huraa and Voavah know that one of the most important aspects of reef regeneration is education. School visits to local islands spread the conservation message and inspire a sense of custodianship of the reefs. Landaa also runs a marine biology internship for local students that is now in its third year, while guests at both resorts can learn about the pioneering project through hands-on reef building, as well as immersive programs for juniors at Kuda Huraa and Trainee Marine Savers modules for environmentally minded teens at Landaa Giraavaru.
Four Seasons also sponsors a number of frames every week, although the majority are sponsored by guests. 'A key part of our role here is to spread knowledge and spark interest,' concludes Armando. 'What happens next is largely down to the passion, drive and commitment of those who visit the Maldives and choose to become the ocean stewards of the future through involvement in sponsorship programs and internships. When it comes to marine conservation, we are all in this together.'
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Web Release
15-04-2025
- Web Release
Milestone Moment as Four Seasons Resorts Maldives Plant 9000th Coral Frame
The blue-hued Maldives are renowned for marking milestone moments. At Four Seasons Resorts Maldives, a very special celebration has taken place this month; one that impacts the future of the islands themselves. In partnership with Reefscapers, the Res orts planted their 9000th coral frame in the ocean, the latest landmark in a series of pioneering marine conservation projects that span more than two decades. One of the most successful coral restoration projects of its kind in the world, the reef regeneration efforts at Four Seasons Resorts Maldives were born in the wake of the 1997-1998 El Nino bleaching event. Coastal oceanographer Thomas Le Berre of Seamarc Pvt. – now Reefscapers – approached the then new-to-the-Maldives Four Seasons with his dreams of coral propagation. A visionary partnership was born, leading to one of the Indian Ocean's largest masses of artificial reefs to date covering 3.05 acres (2,351 square metres). Supported by Four Seasons, Thomas's research led to the development of a revolutionary coral frame technique. Now adopted by conservationists worldwide, it involves attaching small coral fragments onto metal frames that are then planted on the seabed to regenerate coral reefs. Like the coral it supports, the project has grown in myriad ways over the years. The coral propagation success at Four Seasons Resorts Maldives at Landaa Giraavaru and Kuda Huraa led to Marine Discovery Centres at both Resorts served by a team of 11 full-time marine biologists. Marine conservation projects there include coral spawning research, sea turtle rehabilitation, and a Fish Lab to breed ornamental reef fish in captivity, reducing pressures on the natural reef. Landaa also became the birthplace of The Manta Trust – now a global charity dedicated to the worldwide protection of manta rays. Reefscapers and Four Seasons continue to evolve reef restoration. Resort guests at Four Seasons two resort islands as well as Four Seasons Private Island at Voavah can transplant their own reef and watch it grow via online photo updates. In 2020, the onsite development of an AI catamaran that uses robotics to improve monitoring efforts led to the publication of the world's largest coral restoration study to date in peer-reviewed journal Nature Ecology & Evolution, using Artificial Intelligence to assess, analyse and record data. Climate change poses a huge threat to a country reliant on coral reefs. In 2016, the teams were devastated when 90 percent of the shallow water corals in Baa died in a bleaching event. When a mass bleaching event was predicted in 2024, the onsite Reefscapers teams were able to take preventative action, relocating an incredible 28,000 corals – between 450 and 500 frames – from shallow 2-3 metre sites to depths of 6-12 metres in a bid to save them. On nearby island Fulhadhoo, building the coral frames supports the local economy. The frames are made from metal rebars and coated in a special mix of sand and resin to protect them from corrosion. Fragments of Acropora corals – collected from local healthy mature colonies – are attached securely before the frame is labelled, planted in the reef and photographed for monitoring purposes. 'Our 9,000th coral frame is an uplifting milestone for us,' comments Armando Kraenzlin, Regional Vice President and General Manager at Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru. 'The Reefscapers teams at Four Seasons Resorts Maldives are all inspired by a shared love for the ocean and a determination to protect it from harm caused by human actions. As the restoration sites grow, we are seeing significant growth in the numbers of smaller species that live in and around the coral. This in turn attracts larger animals including sharks, eagle rays and turtles around the sites – restoring hope with every frame.' The Reefscapers teams at Landaa Giraavaru, Kuda Huraa and Voavah know that one of the most important aspects of reef regeneration is education. School visits to local islands spread the conservation message and inspire a sense of custodianship of the reefs. Landaa also runs a marine biology internship for local students that is now in its third year, while guests at both resorts can learn about the pioneering project through hands-on reef building, as well as immersive programs for juniors at Kuda Huraa and Trainee Marine Savers modules for environmentally minded teens at Landaa Giraavaru. Four Seasons also sponsors a number of frames every week, although the majority are sponsored by guests. 'A key part of our role here is to spread knowledge and spark interest,' concludes Armando. 'What happens next is largely down to the passion, drive and commitment of those who visit the Maldives and choose to become the ocean stewards of the future through involvement in sponsorship programs and internships. When it comes to marine conservation, we are all in this together.'
Khaleej Times
08-04-2025
- Khaleej Times
World's 'exceptional' heat streak lengthens into March
Global temperatures hovered at historic highs in March, Europe's climate monitor said on Tuesday, prolonging an unprecedented heat streak that has pushed the bounds of scientific explanation. In Europe, it was the hottest March ever recorded by a significant margin, said the Copernicus Climate Change Service, driving rainfall extremes across a continent warming faster than any other. The world meanwhile saw the second-hottest March in the Copernicus dataset, sustaining a near-unbroken spell of record or near-record-breaking temperatures that has persisted since July 2023. Since then, virtually every month has been at least 1.5 degrees Celsius hotter than it was before the industrial revolution, when humans began burning massive amounts of coal, oil and gas. March was 1.6C above pre-industrial times, extending an anomaly so unusual that scientists are still trying to fully explain it. "That we're still at 1.6C above preindustrial is indeed remarkable," said Friederike Otto of the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment at Imperial College London. "We're very firmly in the grip of human-caused climate change," she told AFP. Scientists had predicted the extreme run of global temperatures would subside after a warming El Nino event peaked in early 2024, but they have stubbornly lingered well into 2025. "We are still experiencing extremely high temperatures worldwide. This is an exceptional situation," Robert Vautard, a leading scientist with the United Nations' climate expert panel IPCC, told AFP. 'Climate breakdown' Scientists warn that every fraction of a degree of global warming increases the intensity and frequency of extreme weather events such as heatwaves, heavy rainfall and droughts. Climate change is not just about rising temperatures but the knock-on effect of all that extra heat being trapped in the atmosphere and seas by greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane. Warmer seas mean higher evaporation and greater moisture in the atmosphere, causing heavier deluges and feeding energy into storms. This also affects global rainfall patterns. March in Europe was 0.26C above the previous hottest record for the month set in 2014, Copernicus said. Some parts of the continent experienced the "driest March on record and others their wettest" for about half a century, said Samantha Burgess of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, which runs the Copernicus climate monitor. Bill McGuire, a climate scientist from University College London, said the contrasting extremes "shows clearly how a destabilised climate means more and bigger weather extremes". "As climate breakdown progresses, more broken records are only to be expected," he told AFP. Elsewhere in March, scientists said that climate change intensified a blistering heatwave across Central Asia and fuelled conditions for extreme rainfall which killed 16 people in Argentina. Puzzling heat The spectacular surge in global heat pushed 2023 and then 2024 to become the hottest years on record. Last year was also the first full calendar year to exceed 1.5C -- the safer warming limit agreed by most nations under the Paris climate accord. This single year breach does not represent a permanent crossing of the 1.5C threshold, which is measured over decades, but scientists have warned the goal is slipping out of reach. According to Copernicus, global warming reached an estimated 1.36C above pre-industrial levels in October last year. If the 30-year trend leading up to then continued, the world would hit 1.5C by June 2030. Scientists are unanimous that burning fossil fuels has largely driven long-term global warming, and that natural climate variability can also influence temperatures from one year to the next. But they are less certain about what else might have contributed to this record heat spike, or how this impacts our understanding about how climate might behave in future. Vautard said there were "phenomena that remain to be explained" but the exceptional temperatures still fell within the upper range of scientific projections of climate change. Experts think changes in global cloud patterns, airborne pollution and Earth's ability to store carbon in natural sinks like forests and oceans could be among factors contributing to the planet overheating. Copernicus uses billions of measurements from satellites, ships, aircraft and weather stations to aid its climate calculations. Its records go back to 1940 but other sources of climate data -- such as ice cores, tree rings and coral skeletons -- allow scientists to expand their conclusions using evidence from much further in the past. Scientists say the current period is likely to be the warmest the Earth has been for the last 125,000 years.
The National
05-04-2025
- The National
Uncovering Arabia's Bronze Age 'tomb boom'
While the pyramids of Egypt are probably the Middle East's most spectacular tombs, the Arabian Peninsula has a wealth of monumental burial structures. New research has highlighted how north-west Arabia alone is home to tens of thousands of such constructions – although mysteries remain regarding who built them and why tomb fashions changed over time. A study based on the analysis of drone photographs has described how some of these structures were pendant-shaped with elaborate 'tails' stretching off from the tomb. Writing in Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy, researchers in Australia and Saudi Arabia note that as far back as the sixth millennium BCE, monumental tombs were built across the Arabian peninsula. However, these early constructions tended to be simple cairns or cist burials, which involve stone-lined rectangular chambers. It was during the Bronze Age, lasting from about 3000BCE to 1200BCE, that most of the large and elaborate burial structures were built. During this time some people were buried in the striking pendant structures, with the tomb in the head and a tail that could be more than 100 metres long. Others were buried in tower tombs. 'A significant number of these pendant burials are located along 'funerary avenues', pathways that are flanked by thousands of tombs that connect many of the oases of the region,' the researchers wrote. 'However, in comparison to the funerary landscapes of greater south-western Asia, comparatively little work has been undertaken on the development and evolution of these structures across the Bronze Age of north-west Arabia.' Dr Hugh Thomas, a lecturer in archaeology at the University of Sydney and the first author of the new study, told The National that it remained uncertain 'why these structures began to appear in the Bronze Age'. 'It does appear that a lot of change [was] happening across the Arabian Peninsula, and also more locally,' he said. At around the time of the tombs' construction, he said, major archaeological sites such as Tayma, an oasis town in the south-western Nafud desert, and Qurayyah, another oasis town, were settled. It all suggested that at this time 'something significant happened', Dr Thomas said, but it is unclear what. 'Not a lot is known about the people who built these elaborate Bronze Age tombs,' he said. 'They are found close to settled areas, such as the Khaybar Oasis, and also in the remote hinterland regions. 'So it appears that all of the local population, no matter where they lived, were part of this burial tradition. But who they were, what they called themselves: these are all things we don't know yet. Hopefully future archaeological work will find this out.' The 'sheer number' of tombs indicated that the structures were not reserved for the elite of society. 'Tens of thousands of tombs are also located well away from these areas, in more remote areas,' he said. 'These were likely built by people who moved across the landscape with their herds of animals.' Comparison of tombs in remote areas to those near the oases, found differences, particularly in the artefacts found inside. Simpler objects, such as beads and jewellery, are more common in hinterland tombs, while more elaborate goods, including pottery and weaponry, were inside tombs close to settled oases such as Tayma or Khaybar, Dr Thomas said. Almost all of the tombs the archaeologists have studied had been disturbed or, often, reused during later periods. They have not identified a Bronze Age tomb that had not been disturbed. 'They are massive structures, highly visible on the landscape,' he said. 'It seems likely that many were reopened within years of being constructed.' The research, sponsored by the Royal Commission for AlUla, which supports the preservation of the region in north-west Saudi Arabia, highlights another interesting feature: around the 19th century BCE, things changed and constructions became much smaller. The researchers are trying to determine whether there was a major societal upheaval that caused communities to stop building monumental tombs. Another possibility, Dr Thomas said, is that funerary practices changed and people lost their desire for grandiose resting places. Then, around the 12th century BCE, there was another major transition, because tomb building in the area stopped. 'It is at this time that Bronze Age cultures across the Levant and the Mediterranean began to collapse,' Dr Thomas said. 'It may be that this is further evidence for massive societal change at this time. But our understanding of this region is still in its infancy compared to places like Greece or Jordan, so hopefully as new archaeological evidence begins to be published, we can be more sure about what led to the creation and cessation of these enigmatic funerary structures.'
