Living coral reefs provide better protection from tsunami waves

Healthy coral reefs provide their adjacent coasts with substantially more protection from destructive tsunami waves than do unhealthy or dead reefs, a Princeton University study suggests.

Initially spurred by the tsunami that devastated the coastlines of the Indian Ocean two years ago, a team of scientists developed the first-ever computer model of a tsunami strike against a reef-bounded shoreline, using a volcanic island as an example. The model demonstrates that healthy reefs offer the coast at least twice as much protection as dead reefs. The finding provides the first quantitative confirmation of a widely held theory regarding the value of living coral reefs as a defense against tsunami waves, which are often generated by powerful undersea earthquakes.