“The ocean needs a big victory”<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the moving words that Ocean on Fire<\/em> – a new short film from Coral Gardeners – leaves you with. It sends chills down your spine. The work that needs to be done underwater to save the world from climate change is more than confronting.<\/p>\n Ocean on Fire<\/em> is a short but incredibly impactful short film directed by award-winning filmmaker Sandra Winther and starring Coral Gardeners\u2019 founder, Titouan Bernicot and Bailey Bass (Avatar: The Way of Water). Produced by the uniquely-talented Earthrise Studio, it centres around a conversation about how the world\u2019s oceans are \u201con fire\u201d.<\/p>\n It\u2019s an ecological crisis on an unprecedented scale, happening below the waterline all over the world. Coral bleaching events are putting oceans in jeopardy. That\u2019s why Coral Gardeners are literally working day-and-night to build more resilient reefs. All in a bid to save what we have left \u2013 and to restore this vital link in the ecological chain for future generations.<\/p>\n Rising sea temperatures aren\u2019t just putting our coral reefs in danger: they\u2019re killing them in mass bleaching events. As the ocean\u2019s temperature rises due to human-made climate change, coral dies off in huge swathes. The once vibrant colours that illuminate the ocean floor, swaying with the symphony of the tides, are replaced by graveyards. Miles and miles of ghostly-white, calcified husks where the effervescent vibrancy once was. A permanent monument to humankind\u2019s failure to protect it.<\/p>\n 2023 saw mass coral bleaching events reported in over 60 countries and territories worldwide – including in our backyard, where the Great Barrier Reef continues to fall victim<\/a>. Coral Gardeners told RUSSH<\/em> that 2024 brought with it one of the largest global mass-coral bleaching events in history. We\u2019re set to see more heartbreaking numbers in the coming years. And as a result, we\u2019re falling into a catastrophically cascading feedback loop.<\/p>\n The faster the ocean warms due to climate change, the faster the coral will bleach. The faster the coral bleaches, the faster we lose the vital ecosystem beneath the waves. The faster we lose the coral, the faster climate change comes for us all.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n We talk about how important it is to plant a tree to capture carbon, but few look offshore to the water, which holds beneath its ice-blue waves the most efficient and effective carbon capture and reduction facility known to man.<\/p>\n Thanks to a delicate balance of coral, phytoplankton, currents and even the salty water itself, our oceans are able to sequester – or capture and retain – up to 25% of human-generated emissions annually. It\u2019s easy to say, but the scale is immense: it\u2019s 38,000 gigatons of carbon. Put another way? It\u2019s the CO2 that almost 1.5 trillion cars would put out in a year.<\/p>\n The ocean actually does more to sequester carbon emissions than even the world\u2019s forests, which capture around 10-15 percent of emissions each year. Both are vitally important, but we\u2019re losing the fight for the forests beneath the waves.<\/p>\n It\u2019s for this reason that Coral Gardeners seek to get the word out. Both chilling and haunting, Ocean on Fire <\/em>is a reminder of how much we have to lose. Watch the five-minute film here, or head to the Coral Gardeners website<\/a> to find out more about how you can support its work.<\/p>\n