National Parks of Taiwan

The Marine National Park Headquarters and the National Sun Yat-sen University Dongsha Atoll Research Station (DARS) jointly completed the 2018 Dongsha Atoll National Park health checkup for coral reefs. The results show that average coral coverage is above the healthy standard (50%) with 62.3% in the outer atoll, and 51% in the atoll lagoons.

The Marine National Park Headquarters indicated that the Dongsha atoll is far from land and subject to little human influence, and therefore one of the best locations to directly observe environmental changes. Recent research also found that typhoons have a huge impact on the coral reef habitats in Dongsha atoll. Although the physical impact can bring damage to coral reef habitats, it might also facilitate seawater disturbance, preventing long-term high water temperatures that might cause massive coral deaths due to bleaching. This is a cycle of mother nature, and these image records taken after the typhoon are perfect for observing the recovery of the coral environment.