From Jennifer Marohasy

By jennifer 

If you care enough to know what damage, real damage, from a cyclone looks like at a coral reef, get yourself to Townsville and book a trip with Adrenalin Snorkel and Dive to John Brewer Reef.

It is not hard to describe parts of John Brewer Reef three weeks after cyclone Kirrily.  My dive buddy, and one of the best underwater cinematographers in the world, Stuart Ireland, described what was once my favourite underwater crevasse overlaid with massive, perfectly arranged, pink plate corals, he now describes it as:

‘Bull in a China Shop Alley.’

All the corals have been picked-up, flipped-over, and smashed-up, at this section of John Brewer Reef.

The plate corals were once so large, and back in April 2022, it was all so aesthetically pleasing because the corals were the right way up, growing together, tastefully arranged, delicately balanced, at varying heights, and a lovely pink.

Many of these massive corals that you can see in our film, ‘Bleached Colourful’, they have been lifted and flipped over.  Such was the power of tropical cyclone Kirrily, barely a category three system as it passed over John Brewer reef.

If you enjoy a good horror film, and you fancy yourself as much more than an armchair environmentalists get out to this reef.   Now.

I described this reef, John Brewer Reef, as the most colourful and beautiful reef that I have ever seen, that was when this same coral reef was making headlines around the world as being at the epicentre of a sixth mass coral bleaching, that was in April 2022 – two years ago.  There were a few corals that had bleaching white, but most of the reef was intact and so colourful.

Cyclone Kirrily passed directly over the top of John Brewer Reef on Thursday January 25, 2024.   As you might visit a friend in hospital consider taking the time to swim with these corals now – the corals as they struggle in recovery.

There are patches of coral that survived the cyclone at John Brewer Reef; there is coral that is still intact and upright with so many fishes, including most of the corals below 7 metres.   So, you can still see good coral and lots of colourful fishes, especially if you go deep.

But my favourite crevasse, and across the reef crest, well the large staghorn/branching corals have been mowed to stubble at the reef crest, and many of the plates scoured back to ugly grey with a thin layer of light green algae.

Dive Master, Skipper and Owner of Adrenalin Snorkel and Dive, Paul Crocombe, assures me these are a perfect surface now for mass recruitment, mass recruitment after the next coral spawning.

He is confident there will be a mass of dinner size plate corals across the reef crest at John Brewer within 5 years.

In the meantime, I’m planning to visit for the spawning in November, and I plan to return after that to see the very first polyps establish and so hopefully – there will be mass recolonisation of this reef crest.

*****

Book your trip with Adrenalin Snorkel and Dive.  This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to see a reef scoured by a cyclone, particularly given both the number and intensity of cyclones is on the wane.  Thank goodness.