Author: Ron Vave
Source: Fiji Times
May 8, 2012

"Most hard corals in Fiji and the world are colourful on the outside but when cracked open or broken, will reveal a white skeleton.

One of the exceptions to this is the blue coral (scientific name: Heliopora coerulea), which has a blue skeleton inside, made of aragonite and iron salts which gives it its blue pigmentation.

In Fiji, sighting of the blue coral is so rare that many divers have not seen it. I have dived 12 years in almost all places in Fiji, but I have never seen a single blue coral. This blue coral, in Fiji, has only been observed in Rotuma and in parts of the Mamanuca Group and Yasawa Group, I had never seen one until last week. It was found on one of the reefs off Tiliva Island, in Viwa."

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