Underwater drones discover coral reefs off Benin, long presumed dead, teeming with life

A coral reef, missing and presumed dead, has been found alive and well off the coast of Benin.

Surveys in the 1960s, focused on identifying promising fishing areas, flagged a possible deep-water coral reef but assumed it must be dead.

Now, using a modern sonar survey and the Deep Sea Camera System provided by the National Geographic Exploration Technology Lab, scientists have found an apparently healthy reef. ...