The Significance of Mooring Buoys for Diving

A mooring buoy is an object that floats in the water and is attached by a line at the bottom of the sea. Typically, buoys are used as a locator or indicator of specific dive sites and used for the boats to attach to. Magic Oceans Dive Resort offers a lot of dive sites all around Anda and in the neighboring towns.

In this article, we are going to discuss the benefits of having mooring buoys in our dive sites.

Concerns

Corals have been forming beautiful reefs for thousands of years; they are scleractinians or, simply put,  “reef-building” corals. Moreover, reefs are diverse ecosystems that house different kinds of marine life. One advantage of having a mooring buoy is to protect the reefs and keep them intact.

But how can we protect the corals using mooring buoys?

Firstly, we need to understand more about the use of an anchor. Anchors play a vital role in any shipping industry. It is a metal or stainless steel heavy device used to drop to the bottom to prevent the ship from drifting away due to wind and currents.

Corals and other macro invertebrates are sessile (fixed in one place) organisms living at the bottom of the sea. Using an anchor can be devastating if you drop it in a coral reef area. Corals are easily broken as the anchor gets dragged along the bottom. As mentioned, these coral reefs house so such a diverse amount of marine life. If the corals are damaged, the other life, the flora and fauna that interacts with this marine ecosystem, will also be affected.

By putting a mooring buoy on a specific site, you can avoid dropping the anchor that further damages the reef. Aside from that, corals can grow in harmony with other macro invertebrates and vertebrates.

In the last few years, Magic Oceans has put plenty of mooring buoys in place around Anda. Unfortunately, a lot of the buoys have been cut loose and removed, often used for things such as traditional fishing.

In 2019, Magic Oceans Dive Resort went to different local government sectors to raise awareness and inform them of the importance of mooring buoys in the different dive sites.

In November and December, with the help of diving colleagues from around the neighborhood, Magic Oceans placed an additional 10 buoys in the Eastern and Western parts of Anda. We are also thankful to Anda Scuba Diving for advising us on the best possible areas to put the mooring buoys in place. What a success!!!

Let us help the marine environment as best as we can, let us protect it for our future generations to come!