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The Great Barrier Reef is dying. And tourists from all over the world are rushing to see it while there's still time.
大堡礁正在死亡。趁來得及，世界各地的游客都急忙跑來觀看。
Nearly 70 percent of people who visited the reef in 2015 said they made the trip to Australia to witness its beauty before it's gone.
2015年，近百分之70參觀大堡礁的游客稱，他們前往澳大利亞，趕在大堡礁消亡前見證它的美麗。
Almost half of the reef's coral has vanished over the past three decades, thanks to warming ocean temperatures, invasive species and coastal development.
由于海洋溫度的升高，入侵物種和沿海地區的開發，過去三十年近一半的珊瑚礁消失了。
And this year, it suffered the worst coral bleaching in recorded history. One study estimated over 90 percent of the reef has been affected.
而今年，它遭受了歷史上最嚴重的珊瑚白化。一項研究估計稱，超過百分之90的珊瑚礁受到影響。
The Australian government thought the reef's dire state would drive tourists away, but it's done the exact opposite. That's great news for the multi-billion-dollar tourism industry but it could be bad news for the reef itself.
澳大利亞政府認為礁的可怕狀態會嚇走游客，然后事實完全相反。這對幾十億美元的旅游業來說是好消息，但對礁本身是個壞的消息。
This phenomenon is called last-chance tourism, and it happens all the time at vanishing destinations, like the Maldives and Galapagos Islands.
這種現象被稱為最后機會的旅游，對于消失地是常有的事，像馬爾代夫和加拉帕戈斯群島。
Researchers fear it could make the reef's plight even worse.
研究人員擔心它會使珊瑚礁的境況更糟糕。
One of the study's authors wrote in The Conversation, There's a vicious cycle at play here: tourists travel to see a destination before it disappears, but in so doing they contribute to its demise, either directly through on-site pressures or through greenhouse gas emissions.
該研究的作者之一寫道，這里有一個惡性循環，在某地消失前游客前往旅游，但這有助于其消亡，要么直接施加現場壓力，要么通過溫室氣體排放。
But a reef scientist told Motherboard the impacts of tourism are actually "overwhelmingly positive."
但一位珊瑚礁科學家告訴Motherboard，旅游業的影響實際上“絕大多數是積極的。”
The greater the value of Great Barrier Reef tourism, the easier it is to justify government investment in reef management.
大堡礁的旅游價值越大，就越容易讓政府進行珊瑚礁管理投資。
It looks like the reef might already be seeing those positive effects. A new video from early September showed at least part of the reef has almost fully recovered from coral bleaching.
看起來珊瑚礁可能已獲得這些積極的影響。九月初的一個新的視頻顯示，至少一部分的珊瑚礁幾乎從珊瑚白化中完全恢復。
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