The Second Death Of Shipwrecks

What comes to mind when you think about the effects of climate change? I guess it depends on where you live and your media consumption habits, but there are a few safe bets: Wildfires, droughts, floods, crashing icebergs, hurricanes and starving polar bears are all recurrent images. But did you ever think about vanishing shipwrecks?

Climate change affects the oceans in several ways, and many of them go under-reported. Even the ones we hear about, like coral bleaching, are often framed as the anecdotal loss of beautiful diving spots, and not as the tragic collapse of the rich biodiversity hubs they are.

That's why this article surprised me so much.

This is, really, a very good article about the effects of global change on marine environments. It covers several issues, such as acidification, sea level rise and hurricanes. It's the angle that is so innovative it caught me unawares: How does climate change affect sunken ships? And while the focus is on archaeology and tourism, it rightly frames the wrecks as ecosystems:

Shipwrecks aren’t necessarily barren, static things, vanished and abandoned to the deep water and the recesses of someone’s foggy memory. They may be moldering, but, [...] they’re often active places — part cultural heritage site, part dynamic ecosystem. They’re constantly in flux, and they’ll be impacted as climate change affects the water that holds them.

The story is very compelling and well-sourced. It's more for beginners than for experts, summarizing complex matters in a simple way. It could have benefited from a better wrap-up, as it kind of forgets about climate change in the critical last two paragraphs. Still, it's a very small fault for such an interesting and innovative story, and I'm sure anyone who reads until the end will be able to forgive it.