Parts of Great Barrier Reef suffer highest coral mortality on record

The Australian Institute of Marine Science said surveys of 12 reefs found up to 72 percent coral mortality, thanks to a summer of mass bleaching, two cyclones, and flooding. In one northern section of the reef, about a third of hard coral had died, the "largest annual decline" in 39 years of government monitoring, the agency said. Often dubbed the world's largest living structure, the Great Barrier Reef is a 2,300 kilometre (1,400-mile) expanse of tropical corals that house a stunning array of biodiversity.