Dear Dorothy,

I am not a coral reef specialist, but I would build artificial reefs with transplanted corals where the original coral reefs used to be. I think that in this manner the coral reef recovery would be accelerated. For the transplants, if action is taken fast enough, the corals exposed by the earthquake could be used, since otherwise they are going to die. Continuous monitoring and plan adjustments would probably be needed during the project execution. As I said, however, I am not a specialist, therefore I don't mind and would even like some feedback on this idea. 

Regards,

Bernardo

Thank you so much Bernado for your answer! It was able to help a lot. Coral transplantation seems like the most appealing and efficient solution for this.

Hello Dorothy! 

I totally agree with Bernardo idea and if you have budget, you can adopt biorock technology to increase mineral accretion and coral growth 

check this link http://www.biorock.org/

hopefully it'll be helpful :)

Thank you so much, Akbar! I'll check it out

Hi Dorothy, as it has been mentioned, transplantation of exposed corals could be a good solution. I am not sure the recovery could be as fast as Bernardo mentions. I remember someone wrote something about coral recovery in Tropical Ester Pacific of Colombia (Gorgona Island)  after earthquake in  1979 that emerged corals from 6m under sea level (chart datum) to 2m above sea level. Mass mortality was high. The recovery took around 12 years, but the circumstances in your local reef may bee different.

Hi Dorothy,

A practical approach would be transplanting of the displaced corals to the zone where they were originally located. Estimating their original depth, etc. Bernardo is right that this initiative needs thorough monitoring.