Dr. David Vaughan was just about to retire when a happy accident had him changing his plans and saving corals all over the world!

While working with corals at the Mote Marine Laboratory in Florida, he was attempting to remove a coral from the bottom of a tank when it broke into a dozen pieces. He was stunned when the pieces regrew to the same size in just three short weeks, instead of the three years it had taken to grow the original coral.

It usually takes 25 to 75 years for corals to reach sexual maturity, so it can take up to 6 years just to plant 600 coral. Vaughan’s way of breaking up corals for reproduction its called “micro-fragmenting,” and it helps them to grow 40 times faster than they do in the wild.

It has since been found that micro-fragmenting works with every single species of coral found in the Florida Reef. It’s working so well that researchers are producing coral faster than they can get tanks to hold them.

Vaughan has since decided to plant 100,000 corals on the Florida Reef Track by 2019. Researchers are aiming to educate other experts about micro-fragmenting and to plant one million corals within the next few years.

It amazing that this little accident is now going to save coral everywhere! It just goes to show that we never know when we are going to come upon something that will change our lives forever.

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