More bad news for Hawaii’s coral reefs.

Coral on Kauai’s north shore are being killed by a bacterial pathogen at an alarming rate, according to scientists.

From the LA Times:

The growth, identified by scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey as both a cyanobacterial pathogen — a bacteria that grows through photosynthesis — and a fungus, is killing all the coral it strikes, and spreading at the rate of 1 to 3 inches a week on every coral it infects.

Terry Lilley, a local biologist, has been tracking the problem: 

“There is nowhere we know of in the entire world where an entire reef system for 60 miles has been compromised in one fell swoop. This bacteria has been killing some of these 50- to 100-year-old corals in less than eight weeks,” Lilley said. “Something is causing the entire reef system here in Kauai to lose its immune system.”

Read the full story here.

(Photo: NOAA)