If the coral refuge of the Red Sea can survive local pollution, scientists think these reefs may be the last ones standing on a rapidly warming planet. But that's a giant 'if'.
Right now, life during this region is moored to the fate of a 45-year-old tanker, gradually rusting away off the western coast of Yemen, with 1,000,000 barrels of oil in its hold.
Neglected by its owners for over five years, this massive old ship – the FSO Safer – represents serious danger, ironically enough.
Ever since war broke out on the mainland between Iran-allied Houthi rebels and Saudi-led forces, the state-owned Yemeni company has lost access to its ship, even for repairs, and rebel forces have to this point refused the international organisation an opportunity to intervene.
Under the established order, environmental experts warn it's just a matter of your time before all 34 of the Safer's storage tanks sink into the ocean, causing an oil spill fourfold the scale of the Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989.
"A 1-million-barrel leak guarantees a regional environmental and humanitarian disaster," a replacement study warns.
"Devastation to the health and livelihoods of immeasurable people living in half a dozen countries along the sea coast would be assured. The air they breathe, the food they harvest bewildered, and their water desalination are all at immediate risk."
According to the study, local currents will make sure the distribution of oil to coral reefs that cover nearly all 4,000 kilometres of the sea coastline.
The Gulf of Aqaba, which is tucked within the northernmost corner of the sea, is home to at least one of the foremost pristine reef ecosystems within the world, and its corals have proved remarkably proof against rising temperatures and ocean acidification. A spill of this magnitude might be its undoing.
Currents of the Red Sea. (Viviane Menezes/WHOI)
Having modelled the distribution of a 30-day Red Sea oil spill in both winter and summer conditions, researchers now warn that we are squandering precious time. The Safer is in its final stages of decay, they say, and that we are approaching the worst season for an oil spill.
In May of this year, a breach of seawater within the hull of the Safer was temporarily patched. Shortly after, in September, officials in the Asian nation claimed to own found an "oil spot" near the vessel, which sits right within the Red Sea's shipping lane.
While these reports haven't been verified, if the ship continues to decay at such a rate into winter, it can be catastrophic.
"It is obvious from the analysis that in winter oil dispersion will extend further north and into the centre of the Red Sea as compared to a spill dispersing during summer," the authors write.
"Therefore, action should be taken before winter, as a winter spill ensures that the oil will spread further north and can [remain] trapped for extended within the Red Sea."
Corals in the Gulf of Aqaba in the Red Sea. (Maoz Fine)
The good news is that rebel forces have ultimately agreed to let the UN inspect and repair the tanker, in line with The big apple Times. The bad news is that this servicing has been delayed until January - if it occurs in the least.
The last time rebel forces agreed to let the UN service the tanker within the summer of 2019, they changed their minds the night before.
"The time is now to stop a possible devastation to the region's waters and therefore the livelihoods and health of countless people living in half a dozen countries along the Red Sea's coast," says coral researcher Karine Kleinhaus from Stony Brook University in the big apple.
"If a spill from the Safer is allowed to occur, the oil would spread via ocean currents to devastate a worldwide ocean resource, because the coral reefs of the northern Red Sea and Gulf of Aqaba are projected to be among the last reef ecosystems within the world to survive the approaching decades."
Most of the time, oil spills come as a surprise - a minimum of to the extent that we do not know after they are visiting occur. But researchers say this is often the foremost advanced warning of a significant spill we've ever had, yet we're squandering the chance to prevent it.
Despite several reports of corroding pipes and leaks, the UN International Maritime Organization (IMO) still has no decisively assured route to repairing the ship or removing the oil, although the vessel is increasingly in danger of sinking.
Besides, repairs are probably not visiting cut it at now, although they might buy us precious time to dump the oil.
"Our last chance to pump off the oil within the vessel and stockpile oil booms regionally to contain an imminent spill is quickly disappearing," the authors warn.
Environmental experts have long described the Safer as a 'floating bomb', and as long as the oil itself has been left to rot, some diplomats think the rebels agree and are using it as a deterrent, "like having a nuclear weapon".
Rebel forces may also see it as leverage. With the correct price, UN officials may well be able to remedy matters, but who to pay and the way much continues to be under intense negotiation.
Some losses, after all, are priceless.
In July, a Yemeni environmental group estimated it'd take 30 years for the environment to recover if the Safer sank, and over 126,000 people during this nation alone could potentially lose their livelihoods from the following pollution.
If pollution clogs up the region's myriad desalination plants, it could deprive countless people of water. Many of these in Yemen are already facing starvation and poverty from the continued war.
"The UN, the IMO, and global oil extraction, refinement and shipping companies must act to protect the Red Sea and its critical marine resources by acting to stop this potentially massive and devastating spill," the authors conclude.
We know what we have to do, now we have to make it happen.
