This story was updated at 5:01 p.m. EDT.
A proposed rule from NOAA Fisheries would bar fishermen from using gear that touches the ocean bottom at a California marine sanctuary to protect rare deep-sea coral reefs.
The rule, released Wednesday, would block the use of bottom-contact fishing gear across a 37-nautical-square-mile area of the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary.
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The area, known as Sur Ridge, is a Manhattan-sized underwater formation about 30 miles off the central California coast with ocean depths ranging from 2,700 to 5,100 feet. It is considered to have some of the largest concentrations of deep-sea coral in North America.
