Has anyone been to Roatán recently? I'm aware that much of the Caribbean's coral has been badly affected by Stoney Coral Loss Disease and I wondered how badly it has been hit.

Any advice / feedback would be greatly appreciated!

Best wishes,

Jenny

@Jenny Stock Checking with a source for you.

Amazing thank you Craig

A friend who just went said Lots of fish, lots of Dead corals. A sad decline in the last few years.

Just returned. I think Roatan no different, no better, no worse, from the rest of the Caribbean basin at large. Everything has suffered from the scd, bleaching and overly warm water. Notice all the floaty stuff generating backscatter, supposedly not typical? Lots of rays and turtles, good number of fish, corals typical. (Nauticam Canon NA-R50, WWL-1, dual Marelux Apollo strobes)

Edited 20 hours ago20 hr by Nemrod

19 hours ago, Jenny Stock said:

Has anyone been to Roatán recently? I'm aware that much of the Caribbean's coral has been badly affected by Stoney Coral Loss Disease and I wondered how badly it has been hit.

Any advice / feedback would be greatly appreciated!

Best wishes,

Jenny

My contact Tim Palmer hasn’t been to Roatan since 2015, but he did work as a PADI course director there. Not a photog. He says to hit up Darren at Turquoise Bay Dive resort. They were doing coral restoration work then.

My dive buddy Nemrod and I dived Roatan in October and despite all of the Caribbean being "less lush and pristine" I still saw and photographed plenty of life......

This year I've been diving for 55 years and recall when the Caribbean was pristine. I think one has to be realistic on a planet trying to support 8 Billion people that it's not going to be the same as 10-20-30+ years ago.

Many divers just starting the last couple decades may not have the means to go to Asia, the Red Sea, Maldives, Australia, Philippines, Indonesia or Maldives which all can be "less than people recall back in the day". My 11 year old grandson rolls his eyes telling me; "Grandpa, no one wants another story from back in the day!" LOL......

The Caribbean is still worth diving and fun to photograph underwater. :)

Just one old guy's opinion!

David Haas

Edited 11 hours ago11 hr by dhaas

Fabulous

3 hours ago, dhaas said:

My dive buddy Nemrod and I dived Roatan in October and despite all of the Caribbean being "less lush and pristine" I still saw and photographed plenty of life......

This year I've been diving for 55 years and recall when the Caribbean was pristine. I think one has to be realistic on a planet trying to support 8 Billion people that it's not going to be the same as 10-20-30+ years ago.

Many divers just starting the last couple decades may not have the means to go to Asia, the Red Sea, Maldives, Australia, Philippines, Indonesia or Maldives which all can be "less than people recall back in the day". My 11 year old grandson rolls his eyes telling me; "Grandpa, no one wants another story from back in the day!" LOL......

The Caribbean is still worth diving and fun to photograph underwater. :)

Just one old guy's opinion!

David Haas

Fabulous thanks so much David. Great pictures! Love the squid. Thanks for letting me know and interesting that you were there in October - not managed to speak to anyone else who's been there post pandemic.

12 hours ago, Nemrod said:

Just returned. I think Roatan no different, no better, no worse, from the rest of the Caribbean basin at large. Everything has suffered from the scd, bleaching and overly warm water. Notice all the floaty stuff generating backscatter, supposedly not typical? Lots of rays and turtles, good number of fish, corals typical. (Nauticam Canon NA-R50, WWL-1, dual Marelux Apollo strobes)

Thank you Nemrod, looks like you got some great action. I've just got back from Turks and Caicos so wondered if it would be the same story. Looks like you got some great fishy action. Can't say your pics look too backscattery at all though! Good job if there was lots of it around :-)

On 11/21/2025 at 3:45 PM, Dave_Hicks said:

A friend who just went said Lots of fish, lots of Dead corals. A sad decline in the last few years.

hmmm yes it's the dead corals I'm concerned about....

I think the problem is people keep wanting to compare fabulous Pacific dive spots to the Caribbean....

They're two world apart destinations, different amount of population, infrastructure and more....Each will be different plus the time since someone visited last and other factors will influence one's opinion.

I could dive the same island year after year and each trip will have different temperature, visibility, animal encounters, etc.

Example: The Mantas at "Manta Point" won't necessarily get your memo of taking a week from work or life and you'll be arriving !!!!! LOL......Plus who knows WHEN a site got named that and by whom.......

After 5 decades I just go underwater and LOOK AROUND......There's always something to see and enjoy :)

Just get out there and photograph at any level of competence and desire.......

You're sure to have fun with that approach !!!

DH

Some old guy still traveling and enjoying the ocean world :)

Edited 6 hours ago6 hr by dhaas

49 minutes ago, dhaas said:

I think the problem is people keep wanting to compare fabulous Pacific dive spots to the Caribbean....

This is wildly wishful thinking David. We are comparing the Caribbean to how much of it looked 5 or 10 years ago. There has been a dramatic and rapid decline.

The sad part is that we will likely be saying the same things about the fabulous Pacific dive spots in another 5 or 10 years as they continue and accelerate their decline.

Edited 5 hours ago5 hr by Dave_Hicks

Went 2 years ago, the hard coral was in rough shape. Alot of our diving was on the west side, judging by the number of dive boats I saw that side gets alot of pressure. We did go to a few sites farther away on the southern side and they were a little better.