00:00 you come back along the florida keys. It's all hands under deck. A massive
00:08 underwater rescue is ongoing after a record hot july prompted unprecedented
00:14 coral bleaching or a reef die off. Put your heart and soul and effort into
00:18 this and frustrating to see your work. Coral is literally boiled to death in
00:24 unseasonably hot water. The shallower the water, the more you'll be stressed
00:28 and higher the heat often. So we're we're moving our corals to a deeper
00:32 nursery to try and save them for this heat event. Now we're about seven miles
00:35 offshore of little torch key. This is one of the many evacuation zones all up
00:39 and down the florida keys. Makeshift triage units are popping up all along
00:44 the keys where the live coral is staged based on how sick it is. Brown coral is
00:49 healthier and has a good chance of going back into the ocean. But the
00:52 lighter or whiter the coral is, the more critically sick, which means a trip
00:58 to the marine intensive care unit, dive shop owner and reef restorationist
01:02 Mike Goldberg is worried those corals in the shallow waters, which are very
01:06 important for surge. When we get storms, those are some of the most important
01:10 barriers that we have. Uh, they are feeling it and they're likely going to
01:15 see a significant mortality. Reef conservationists are trying to
01:20 propagate multiple species that thrive in different environments in hopes of
01:24 hybrid coral will be able to withstand not only rising ocean temperatures, but
01:29 disease hurricanes and more. We don't know that the coral that resists heat
01:35 is going to be able to resist cold to resist disease. We have to plant
01:39 everything that we have left and hope that whatever takes is enough to bring
01:43 back the system. I'm Leslie Hudson for Accuweather.
01:46 (water splashing)
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