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Scientists left cinderblocks in a barren part of the sea. 3 months later they were ecstatic.

Coral reefs are dying at alarming rates. Concrete may be a creative solution.

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Scientists are turning simple concrete into the building blocks for a healthier ocean.

A viral video has been making the rounds lately that shows a giant (and extremely bizarre) ship opening up at its middle and dropping a metric buttload—that's the official term—of cinderblocks directly into the ocean. The video is fascinating, so much so that I was certain it was AI-generated at first. After all, what kind of ship can part down the middle like that?

Turns out, the video is real! The ship is called a split hopper barge and is often used to transport and deliver dredged soil. Dumping concrete like this looks like the world's worst case of littering, but in actuality, the concrete blocks serve an important purpose that benefits sea life of all varieties.

But how?

For answers, look no further than the GARP — that's the Grenada Artificial Reef Project (also known as the Grand Anse Artificial Reef Project or GAARP).

With coral reefs under threat and disappearing all over the world, the team behind the project came up with an interesting solution they wanted to test out.

In 2013, the scientists placed four concrete pyramids (basically, cinderblocks stacked together into something of a tower structure) in a barren part of the Caribbean Sea. The location was just off the coastal beaches of Grenada.

In just 3 months, the pyramids had attracted tons of marine life.

The block pyramids gave shelter to the animals who otherwise had nowhere to hide, nest, or feed in this part of the water. "An initial growth of algae and colourful encrusting sponge was soon followed by a varied range of invertebrates. These included feather duster worms, lobster, crab, and urchins. Excitement developed as we started to see a range of juvenile fish including squirrel fish, goat fish, grunts and scorpionfish," says the official website.

After a year, word must have spread among the fish, because the simple concrete blocks transformed into "buzzing diverse communit[ies] of marine life."

At around 18 months, things started to get really exciting. Stony and brain corals, described as the "building blocks of coral" began to appear on the pyramids.

Over the following 10 years, the project has exploded with more and more coral growing on the blocks and more fish and other sea life moving in. "Each subsequent year more pyramids have been added to increase biomass. GARP is becoming a balanced ecosystem, home to over 30 species of fish, 14 different kinds of corals and many of the invertebrates and algae you would find on a naturally occurring reef."

Today, there are upwards of 100 pyramid blocks in the location. Other, similar projects are taking place in waterways all over the globe.

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GARP/GAARP isn't the first or only project of its kind. Concrete has been shown again and again to make an excellent shelter for marine life and a perfect launching pad for new coral growth.

People have tried other materials before, to varied results. One such project off the coast of Florida in the 1970s utilized millions (!) of old tires in an effort to create new fish habitats. Called the Osborne Reef, the effort is now considered a major ecological disaster as storms and sea currents have tossed many of the tires around, washing them ashore and even damaging otherwise healthy natural reefs nearby. Talk about a backfire. Major clean up initiatives to undo the damage are still underway.

Specialized concrete structures are heavy enough to stay put in rough conditions and are one of the few things that can withstand years and years of being battered by rough, salty seawater without degrading.

Coral reefs are disappearing around the globe at an alarming rate. Physical damage, both natural and manmade, along with pollution, coral harvesting, global warming, and bleaching wreaks havoc on natural ecosystems under the sea.

Coral reefs aren't just there to look pretty. They dampen waves and currents before they hit land, reducing erosion and protecting people who live on the coast. Reefs are home to a huge variety of marine life who use it for shelter and finding food. And, finally, they're amazing destinations for scientific discovery—new species and even medical treatments are being discovered on reefs all the time!

All that and the very existence of coral reefs may be in jeopardy, according to the EPA.

There's no easy fix to this grave problem. Natural coral reefs take thousands of years to grow and mature. So, even with all the cinderblocks in the world acting as growth platforms, it would be impossible for us to replace all the coral we've already killed or destroyed. Saving our oceans must be a multi-faceted effort, with initiatives that combat pollution and rising sea temperatures in addition to creating artificial reefs.

But projects like GARP/GAARP are an awesome start. They may not save the planet all on their own, but if you ask me, those fish look pretty darn grateful for their new home.

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Serene and beautiful photos of the world's first eco-friendly underwater burial ground.

Losing a loved one is hard for a number of reasons.

While the grieving process itself takes a toll, you might also find yourself needing to make several difficult decisions. There are legal issues, people to notify, decisions about the person's property or belongings, and a million choices about funeral arrangements.

If the death is unexpected or isn't thoroughly planned for, those decisions get even harder.

One of those decisions is what to do with your loved one's remains, and believe it or not, there are a lot of options.

Sure, you can go the traditional burial route, and there's always cremation, where you can either keep the ashes around or do something cool like toss them into your grandpa's favorite fishing spot (cue single manly tear).

This is for you, grandpa. You urn'd it. (Sorry just trying to lighten the mood.) Photo by Chris Hondros/Getty Images.

There are also an increasing number of creative options for paying tribute to your loved ones. You can turn your loved one into a tree or a diamond or even a toaster, and if they were a music lover, you can even have their ashes pressed into a vinyl record. Really.

Another option sits off the coast of Miami in Key Biscayne. It's called the Neptune Memorial Reef, and it's the first underwater graveyard.

It's also the largest human-made reef ever built. Naturally occurring coral reefs exist all over the world, but they can also be made artificially.

A reef is essentially just a complex group of shapes underwater. They're important because they can provide shelter for small fish, protection from storms, surface area for algae and coral to grow on, and they generally help promote diversity within an ecosystem.

To make an artificial reef, you can sink something like an old ship to the bottom of the ocean, where coral and algae can grow on it and create a safe home for dozens of species.

When it comes to burying a loved one at the Neptune Memorial Reef, you can have their ashes spread at the site or purchase a plaque with their name on it to become part of the reef itself.

A memorial plaque at the Neptune reef. Photo by Todd Murray/Flickr.

They also offer various cremation and memorial services.

The reef was carefully designed in order to promote the healthiest ecosystem possible — something anyone who loves the ocean and environment can appreciate.

"Every angle and texture of the Reef was engineered by a marine biologist to attract and support certain marine life to build an ecosystem," their website says, explaining that the vertical structures are home to "corals and coraling algae" while decorative holes were added to the design as a hiding place that "allows prey animals passage while blocking predators."

Appropriately, the Neptune reef was also made to resemble Atlantis — a fictional city that was lost underwater in Greek myths.

What better way to celebrate the life of a loved one than by preserving their memory in a way that helps protect and promote life?

Whether your loved one was an ocean-lover or just someone who loved this planet we all call home, an underwater grave site is a pretty beautiful — and special — resting place.

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Belize is working hard to save coral reefs. These kids may be their secret weapon.

Abalone Caye is a small island off the coast of Belize, and for about a week, it's home to an important group of kids.

The island, located in the middle of the Port Honduras Marine Reserve, is home to a small research station where five local college-age kids eat, work, and live together for a week each summer before heading back to the mainland.

There's a good reason for this expedition: These kids are in training to become community reef researchers.

Photo from TIDE, used with permission.

The Community Researcher Training Program is managed by James Foley and the Toledo Institute for Development and Environment (TIDE), an environmental institute in Belize. TIDE manages a large swath of natural areas in southern Belize, including the Port Honduras Marine Reserve. And the students, who all come from local communities, conduct research that's vital to helping us protect our coral reefs.

They learn how to do scientific research that'll help TIDE monitor and protect the reef, such as taking underwater fish counts, going out with fishermen to weigh their catches, or doing surveys of the local markets.

Foley also teaches them professional-level scuba diving as well as teamwork, which can be really important since the work means they may have to stay out on boats (or tiny islands) for hours or days at a time.

Photo from TIDE, used with permission.

Nice, right? But let's pause for a second and zoom out. Because big picture: Our reefs are in trouble, and they desperately need good management.

Coral reefs are an amazing ecosystem, but climate change is disrupting the little animals that make reefs, causing a potentially fatal problem known as coral bleaching. What's more, poor fishing practices means that reefs have been overfished, polluted, poisoned, trawled, and even blasted with dynamite.

Bleached coral in the Great Barrier Reef. Photo by Acropora/Wikimedia Commons.

Looking at all these problems caused by people, it's tempting to say, "OK, fine, we'll just close them off and keep everyone out." But that's neither realistic nor fair. Communities rely on these reefs for food and income, so managed access to the reefs is necessary in most areas around the world.

But managed access isn't just about limiting the number of fishermen — it's about studying and monitoring reef health and making policy changes as necessary, which is where the Community Researcher Training Program comes in. If we can head off problems like overfishing and pollution, we can help keep reefs healthy.

Foley's program has been successful because local communities don't always trust outsiders who come in and start telling people to change.

Often these communities have been living next to and with reefs for generations. They have deep cultural, historical, and economic ties to the reefs and their way of life.

So when a foreigner comes in – who hasn't lived there, whose family hasn't spent years fishing there – and starts ordering people around, it's understandable that locals would be mistrustful.

Foley has experienced this firsthand. He said that when he first arrived at TIDE, he'd try to talk to locals the conventional way, gathering locals into a room with graphs or discussions about trends and trying to tell them about changes they needed to make. But his words weren't always received well.

"People would be standing up, interrupting me, and saying 'You don't know what you're talking about. I've been fishing here all my life, and my father before me,'" Foley said.

And outsiders aren't always the best candidates for the job anyway.

Some research or management organizations rely on foreign volunteers, but doing that can come with drawbacks. You can't always count on volunteers having a lot of scientific training. Outsiders might also not understand the local environment or culture.

Even if the outsiders are highly trained professionals, it can still be a problem. Foley mentioned seeing otherwise good science derailed by a lack of local knowledge — some bit of information the scientist missed but that all the local fishermen knew by heart.

And at the end of the day, they don't live there. While a force of foreign volunteers might care deeply about the reef on an emotional or intellectual level, they don't live with it or depend on it for their livelihoods like the locals do.

That's why putting scientific power in the hands of these local kids is an awesome idea.

Photo from TIDE, used with permission.

In fact, many of the same fishermen who were initially distrustful of the program are now on board.

"We've actually had now fishermen standing up in meetings and saying, 'Five years ago, you telling me this, I wouldn't have believed it. But now my own daughter's collecting the data,'" Foley said.

Some of the students in the program are on an academic track already, but others are children of local fishing families and "second-chancers" — kids who've been in trouble with the law or dropped out of school and need another opportunity to succeed.

Foley's been doing this since 2011, and he says the entire program is a win-win. Even if the students don't end up as researchers themselves, they end up with a highly desirable skill set; some have since become tour guides, members of the coast guard, or even TV presenters. And they can still sometimes be called in to help from time to time, too.

This isn't just feel-good fluff, either: Good community management might be the key to saving reefs.

In July 2016, the academic journal Nature published a worldwide survey of coral reefs. The most interesting things they found were called "bright spots," places where reefs were doing substantially better than anyone expected.

A healthy reef can support a gigantic network of different plants and animals. Photo from joakant/Pixabay.

The bright spots weren't just remote, humanless areas either. Some were located right next to huge human populations and fished heavily. So what was the link between the bright spots? Where there were bright spots, local communities were actively involved in monitoring and protecting the reef.

Programs like these may end up being the heart of future reef conservation.

"It's really all about empowering local communities to participate in the management of their natural resources and building trust between the communities," said Foley.

So in the future, if you go diving and find yourself surrounded by magnificent schools of fish, sea turtles, blooms of color, and all the other signs of a healthy coral reef, you might want to remember and thank these community researchers.

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Coral bleaching is about to cause one of the biggest breakups of all time.

Once upon a time, there was coral.

Coral lives in the ocean and forms massive, magnificent reefs when it binds together. The reefs, with their hard bony structure and various nooks and crannies, provide protection and shelter for all manner of marine wildlife.

Photo by Hassan Ammar/AFP/Getty Images.

Then algae came bouncing along, and something beautiful happened.

Algae, one of the oldest lifeforms on the planet, had been drifting through the ocean waters for millions of years, attaching itself to anything it could in order to reproduce.

Algae! Photo via Simon Andrews/Wikimedia Commons.

Algae found a home with coral, and the two quickly fell in love.

Coral provides carbon nutrients and protection for algae, and algae provides food for coral through its photosynthesis. It's a perfect symbiotic partnership, and algae and coral found out they were a match made in heaven. On Earth. In the ocean.

Everyone was happy. Photo by Donald Miralle/Getty Images.

For hundreds of millions of years, coral and algae's relationship has been rock solid. But times are unfortunately changing.

You know how sudden, massive changes in your life can put a stress on your relationship? Like the loss of a job or a death in the family? Well, the same thing can happen to coral and algae.

When the couple's environment experiences sudden changes, coral reefs can get stressed out, which affects its ability to be the good, supportive partner algae fell in love with. The algae is then forced to abandon the coral and seek out a better life elsewhere in the sea.

This is a process known as coral bleaching.

The coral looks "bleached" because algae is what gives it its bright green color. Photo by STR/AFP/Getty Images.

One of the largest coral reefs in the world, the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, has been abandoned by almost all of its algae.

It's one of the most significant coral bleaching events ever recorded and possibly the biggest oceanic celebrity breakup since South America left Africa in the great Pangea split.

Currently, 93% of the Great Barrier Reef has been left by its algae — a scarily high number, one which has never been seen before.

The Great Barrier Reef is visited by about 1.6 million people every year. Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images.

Who's to blame for this deep-sea Shakespearian romantic tragedy?

One of the most significant coral stressors is changing ocean surface temperatures. The "photosynthetic efficiency" of coral and algae's millennias-old lovefest drops if temperatures become too warm or too cold.

Lately, human-made climate change has pushed ocean surface temperatures way above normal. Australian ocean temperatures are also greatly affected by El Niño, which has recently become more extreme as a result of the greenhouse warming of the planet.

Greenpeace activists painting a message on the side of a coal ship. Photo by Greenpeace via Getty Images.

That temperature shift has forced algae to pack its bags and leave the Great Barrier Reef cold, lonely, and in serious danger.

To be fair, parts of the Great Barrier Reef will regain their algae population when (or if) ocean temperatures drop back down. But scientists have already seen large portions of the reef permanently die due to the sudden loss of algae.

Some scientists estimate that the Great Barrier Reef will face total extinction in decades. Photo by Phil Walter/Getty Images.

Global climate change will also continue to produce temperature extremes unless we do something about it, meaning that coral stressors will become worse and worse every year, and these bleaching events will become even more significant.

There are 8 billion reasons to fight climate change. Now there's one more.

One of Earth's oldest and best love stories is coming to an end off the coast of Australia, but fighting back against climate change can save it.

If you don't want to do it for humanity, do it for Earth's greatest couple. Do it for a partnership that deserves to continue.

Do it for love.

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