

Join me diving deep into the mystical Indian Ocean today. Are you ready? Let`s dive right in.
Imagine that you are sitting inside a bullet and tsunami proof submarine, which has glass walls, so you can see everything around you. I`ll be your underwater tour guide, so sit back and relax. Now look around
Right under the surface of the water everything is smooth and calm. Say hello to my tiny turtle friend swimming around peacefully right in front of our eyes. He is not even bothered that we am around.
We have clowns underwater too! We see some clown fish right in front of our eyes. I am sure you have seen clown fish before in some aquariums and it was also the main character in the popular movie Finding Nemo
We even have goats underwater. Meet my friend the goat fish posing for this photoshoot.
My friend the eagle ray promised to show his support by joining us on this guided tour. There he is!
To the left right bellow us we see my friend the black tip shark living his everyday life undisturbed. Lets wave to him to say hello
We are getting deeper and deeper. Meanwhile let me tell you about the biggest tragedy, which started in 2016 and left the whole underwater area in undescribable devastation for many years. Us locals just call him the dark knight El Niño
We got hit by this global catastrophe during 2016 and the dark knight El Niño bleached around 80% of coral reefs here in the Maldives. El Nino is a climate phenomenon that occurs when a vast pool of water in the Eastern tropical Pacific Ocean becomes abnormally warm. Under normal conditions, warm water and the rain it drives are in the western Pacific. This El Niño was among the strongest on record on our planet. The dark knight affects the ocean with everything in it. It was also accompanied by extreme weather conditions, which affected life both under and above water.
Here you can see some of the bleached coral reefs. They are supposed to be colourful, but these are white so they are not healthy
These too. As you can see some have still not recovered.
These here are purple, so they are either dying or recovering. First they turn purple and the white, but after a week of time algae starts growing on the white corals which turn into brown. You can see the brown to the right.
Luckily no horror lasts forever! After rain comes sun, and after el nino life returns to the Pacific Ocean too. Here you can see some which have recovered already. Different species of coral reef have different colors. They are colourful and there is a lot of life in and around them. It`s like big cities underwater.
Just watch and enjoy. It`s like the screensaver on your laptop
Generally it takes about 10 years for coral reefs to recover. Luckily the area has recovered a lot and the horror starts fading out. Just a bad memory, nightmare. We pray for the dark knight to never come back again.
Hope you have enjoyed today`s underwater guided tour of the Maldives.
Until next time enjoy and stay safe on the main land.
Next time I will take you somewhere special here in the Maldives. Stay tuned in.
Nazim