Dubai‘s largest reef, consisting of over 1,100 coral-encrusted rocks, has been moved to a new location to protect it from future development. Details of the relocation have been kept secret for more than a year to ensure its success, and the transfer was therefore not announced until today, on World Environment Day.

not the reef in the article!

Oddly enough, no one seems to have known about the existence of the reef until Dubai real estate development company Nakheel conducted an environmental assessment of Dubai Dry Docks’ breakwater.

“What we found [in the initial assessment] was the biggest coral reef in Dubai and an area of extreme importance, said marine biologist John Burt, Assistant Professor at Zayed University, who was brought on board as an independent expert. “Because of the conditions in the Gulf – where the water temperature can reach 35C and drop to 15C – coral has difficulty establishing itself. However, it has learned to adapt and we believed it was important to do everything we could to protect this reef.”

Moving 1,129 rocks

Traditional methods of moving corals were quickly dismissed, since they typically result in the death of up to 30 percent of the corals. Instead, Nakheel and their team of engineers and scientists decided to remove, lift and transport the corals by barge without ever taking them out of the water.

“Traditionally, when coral is moved it is chiselled or drilled from rocks, placed in baskets and shipped to a new location,” said Brendan Jack, Head of Sustainability and Environment for Nakheel Northern Projects. “That wasn’t open to us because each of the rocks was encased in coral, so we went back to the drawing board to find an engineering solution. Nothing like this has ever been attempted before and we are very pleased with the outcome.”

The project took five weeks to complete and involved engineers and divers drilling an iron bolt into each and every one of the rocks and attaching it to a sling. After being hoisted from its resting place, each rock had its sling fastened to one of several mountings welded to the deck of a 90-metre barge. Thanks to this new method, the coral rocks could be moved to their new home at The World’s breakwater without ever leaving the water.

With no more than 20 rocks being transported to The World at a time; it took 50 days to move the 1,129 rocks – each of them weighing about five tonnes. Sadly enough, some rocks had to be left behind since they could not be reached by the marine crane.

“We could not take all of the coral,” said Burt. “In some places the water was too shallow for the crane so the rocks had to be left. I believe once development around the Dry Docks breakwater begins the remaining coral has no chance of survival.”

The result

Initial studies of the relocated coral have been very promising and so far the project seems to have been successful. As mentioned above, up to 30 percent of the coral usually give up the ghost when traditional relocation methods are used but in the case of the Dubai reef only 7 percent of the corals have died. Independent scientific study of the coral is continuing and a scientific peer-reviewed research paper will be published once the study is complete in the coming months.

The future

The World, where the coral reef is now residing, is a man made archipelago of 300 islands constructed in the shape of a world map and located 4 km off the coast of Dubai. The total area now covered by coral at The World is 6,560 square metres and this number may increase as corals begin to colonize nearby surfaces.

“A number of the dominant corals, now at The World, are ‘broadcast spawners’ and their reproductive activities could result in the development of coral on nearby rocks”, said a Nakheel spokesman.

The exact location of the relocated reef is still being kept secrete to avoid attracting commercial and recreational fishermen. However, once the new coral colony is firmly established it may be opened up for scuba diving and similar activities.