ReefBeacon began with three places: the marine parks of Hoi Ha Wan, Yan Chau Tong and Tung Ping Chau, on the eastern edge of Hong Kong’s waters. Today the network watches 65 coral reef stations across 8 ocean regions — and the way it grew says a lot about how it is meant to work.
Why stations, not whole oceans
Heat stress is local. Two reefs a few kilometres apart can sit on opposite sides of a current and accumulate very different Degree Heating Weeks. That is why ReefBeacon tracks named stations with defined boundaries — official protected areas first — rather than averaging heat across vast stretches of sea. Averages hide exactly the reefs that need help.
Eight regions, one standard
The network now spans Hong Kong (its home region), East Asia, Southeast Asia, Oceania, the Caribbean and North Atlantic, the East Pacific, the Red Sea and the Middle East, and the Indian Ocean. Region by region, stations were added where coral conservation teams could act on an alert: a marine park with a manager, a survey program with divers, an NGO with a response plan. The standard is the same everywhere — daily NOAA 5-km satellite data, the international DHW thresholds, alerts within 30 minutes of a hit.
Honest edges
Not every boundary on the map is an official one. Thirteen of the 65 stations use approximated boundaries — drawn where no formally adopted polygon exists — and the platform marks them as unofficial rather than quietly pretending otherwise. A monitoring network earns trust by declaring its rough edges, not by hiding them.
Five languages, by design
The platform itself is served in five languages — Simplified and Traditional Chinese, English, Spanish and Portuguese — because alerts are only useful if the team receiving them can read them without translation friction. More languages will follow as the network grows.
Next
The roadmap is straightforward: more stations where conservation teams are ready to use them, deeper automated analysis, and quarterly trend reports reaching more desks. If you monitor a reef that is not yet on the map, we would like to hear from you at hello@fledged.org.