The home of a giant land crab, a sunken island ringed by pink-colored coral, and equatorial waters teeming with sharks and other predators have been designated national marine monuments by U.S. President George W. Bush in the largest marine conservation effort in history. See photos.
The three areas—totaling some 195,274 square miles 505,757 square kilometers—include the Mariana Trench and the waters and corals surrounding three uninhabited islands in the Northern Mariana Islands, Rose Atoll in American Samoa, and seven islands strung along the equator in the central Pacific Ocean.
“We should be very happy because its the largest marine area ever protected,” said Enric Sala, a marine ecologist and National Geographic fellow and emerging explorer. National Geographic News is owned by the National Geographic Society.
“We dont need more research to know that more of these remote intact places need to be protected,” said Sala, who has helped conduct some of the few scientific surveys in the remote central Pacific islands, particularly in the pristine Kingman Reef.
“This is the only chance we have left to protect parts of the ocean that are still natural.”
