00:03our planet's waters are warming we know that however scientists have only been tracking them
00:08since the turn of the 20th century however this single coral found in the Pacific Ocean just off
00:13the coast of Fiji is giving researchers tons of data on ocean temperatures long before that but
00:18how well it's more than 600 years old which they say means that trapped within it is more than 600
00:23years of climate data that has now been harvested they collected a sample from the honeycomb coral
00:28which was discovered way back in 1998 finding that it included markers from some 627 years ago
00:35meaning researchers can actually tell what Pacific Ocean temperatures were all the way back to the
00:39year 1370 the samples revealed that the sea in which the coral resides was around the same temperature
00:44in 1370 and in 1553 as it is today due to normal variations and cycles in ocean temperatures though
00:51coral and paleo oceanographic measurements over the last century illustrate that our current ocean
00:56temperatures are not part of the normal cycle the researchers say this coral data is the longest
01:01continuous temperature record of its kind from anywhere in the tropics
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