Pag-asa Islands' corals and cays, or little islands on coral reefs, are now degraded and have been found with a "pile of rubble ... over the height of a person," a sign of island-building activities.

“Many of the corals here in this island, at Pag-asa Island itself, and the cays, are now degraded,” Professor Jonathan Anticamara of the University of the Philippines Institute of Biology said.

“Many of the corals are now small. Many of the large corals are now dead, and there's not a lot of live corals in the area," he explained.

He discovered there were fewer than 10 coral and fish species per 100 square meters, and saw most of the specimens were small.

"I don't know if you can go around the Philippines and find an island that's formed by nature, a typhoon, or a current that will form that height," Anticamara said of the pile. He speculated that it is "possibly [a] product of island-building activities."

People "can only see something like this if [they] go to a reclamation area," he added.

The Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) accused the People's Republic of China of being responsible for the Pag-asa Islands' present state.

["If this occurence isn't natural, isn't normal, who dumped this pile there? Right? Well, we have the same suspect in mind, and I think it's also the same one I have in mine. There's no one else we can hold responsible but the People's Republic of China"]

Tarriela reasoned that only China and the Philippines are close by the cays, and that the Philippines has "no experience" destroying corals.

"So it is only the People's Republic of China who has a professional record ng mga ganitong gawain sa South China Sea," Tarriela concluded.