Ocean.org

For years, Ray Collins earned a living in a place far, far away from the ocean - a coal mine. That all changed after a workplace injury left him physically limited. A knee in healing meant no working, no driving and little mobility. So he picked up a camera as a way to keep his brain engaged. His subject? The ocean’s waves. His portraits make time stand still, capturing a split second of motion and freezing it. The hope is, of course, is to make lasting impressions. But he also wants to make sure these photos don’t become historical snapshots of an ocean that once was. Instead he wants the beauty to stir something in us, and drive us all to protect its delicate balance.

Dive deeper:

Catch Ray in the documentary Fishpeople on Netflix and explore his photography here.

Instagram: Ray Collins

Decades ago, Dr. Amanda Vincent was newly armed with a PhD and travelling around Germany when she came across a billboard that changed the course of her life. On a sign lit up in a German plaza was a marketing tagline to remember: “Seahorses are the most valuable exports from the Phillipines to help men with weak tails.” It marked the beginning of a profound career working to protect the unique species from issues like trade and illegal fishing. And while the charismatic fish may have given her organization - Project Seahorse - its name, Dr. Vincent’s work doesn’t stop there. The seahorse’s ecosystems, and the other animals that share those environments, are high on the agenda too.

Dive deeper: Find out how to get involved with Project Seahorse here.

 Project Seahorse

Project Seahorse

Project Seahorse

Brian Skerry remembers vividly the first time he put on scuba gear and was able to breath underwater. Sure, it was in his parents’ backyard pool, but it was life-changing nonetheless. It’s a sensation he’s become intimately familiar with over the last 30 years as he’s built a laudable career as a photojournalist, with more than 25 National Geographic stories to his name. He’s even spent time below the surface with Barack Obama, shooting the first-ever photos of a U.S. president under water. There’s a passion that hasn’t wavered much over the years. What has changed though, is the ocean itself and with that, Brian’s drive to find a delicate balance between documenting human-caused impacts and reasons to be hopeful.

Dive deeper:

Here’s the photo of Brian’s assistant with a southern right whale as well as his picture of former U.S. President Barack Obama. Click here for his online portfolio.

Instagram: Brian Skerry

Twitter: Brian Skerry

Facebook: Brian Skerry

Growing up watching the Apollo missions, Jill Heinerth had one goal in mind: become an astronaut. But, as a young girl growing up in the 60s and 70s, the steps to becoming a female astronaut were not immediately clear, to say the least. So she looked inwards - and started exploring the depths of inner Earth, instead of outer space. As a renowned cave diver, Jill has been to places on this planet that few people have ever been. And, recognizing that fact, she’s using her platform to raise awareness about our need to protect the ever-important resource of water, hoping that “out of sight” (i.e. submerged in a cave) does not equate to “out of mind.”

Named for a famous wave break off the coast of northwest Ireland, Dr. Easkey Britton feels - perhaps unsurprisingly - most at home when surfing. Her family brought the sport to Ireland and she was on her first board at age four. Though she’s competed in - and won - many competitions, including the national championships five times, surfing evolved into something much more emotional for her. After becoming the first woman to surf in Iran, she travelled back many times to help local women experience surfing and the ocean for the first time. She’s now studying the relationship between human well-being and the ocean as part of a major EU research program. Her guiding light is one major question: how do we get everyone to have the same connection to the sea that she’s know her whole life?

Dive deeper: Watch Easkey’s award-winning short film A Lunar Cycle and the documentary Into the Sea, about her surfing in Iran.

Twitter: Dr. Easkey Britton

Instagram: Dr. Easkey Britton

This is the story of what happens when you combine some of the planet’s oldest living and under threat organisms - corals - with some of the newest inventions of modern day society - coding and open source technology. At the centre of this story is Dr. Emily Darling, a conservation scientist with the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS). She specializes in coral reefs and, along with some of her peers, is helping shake up the traditional ways (read: publishing papers) that scientific knowledge is shared. Open-source technology, social media, code - these are the game-changing tools that will speed up collaboration in a race against time. And Dr. Darling is a key player in that game.

Dive deeper: Check out this video of Emily and her WCS colleagues sharing how GitHub is helping them work.

Twitter: Emily Darling and Wildlife Conservation Society

Facebook: Wildlife Conservation Society

Instagram: Wildlife Conservation Society

The Honourable Jonathan Wilkinson had a successful career in the private sector for many years before running for office. The catalyst came during lunch with a friend when Wilkinson got a gentle — but firm — nudge from said friend, who had been patiently listening to him for years as he voiced concern about the direction of Canada’s environmental policy. “What are you going to do about it?” the friend asked. And so began a journey to becoming a MP, being named Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and then on his current post as Canada’s Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard. He may only be a few months into the job, but his familiarity with and love for the country’s waterways dates back a long way.

Twitter: Minister Wilkinson and Fisheries and Oceans Canada

Facebook: Minister Wilkinson and Fisheries and Oceans Canada

Instagram: Minister Wilkinson

Ned Bell, Ocean Wise executive chef, takes over the interviewer seat in our first-ever guest-hosted episode. His guest? Barton Seaver, a Maine-based chef and author of eight cookbooks, and one of Ned’s mentors. The topics? Sustainability versus restoration, wild versus farmed, food from land versus sea. And the result? An insightful, philosophical discussion of what our appetite for seafood has done to our oceans and what we as consumers on this planet can do to help turn things around.

Dive deeper: Check out these cookbooks and recreate recipes from Ned and Barton.

Twitter: Barton Seaver and Ned Bell

Facebook: Barton Seaver and Ned Bell

Instagram: Barton Seaver and Ned Bell

Surfing has been part of Eddie Donnellan’s life for decades. Same goes for working in mental health. And a few years ago, Eddie decided to combine the two to create MeWater Foundation. It’s based in San Francisco and introduces at-risk youth from some of the city’s toughest neighbourhoods to the world of surfing. The physical challenge is just one small piece and Eddie’s goal instead is to empower these young people, to give them confidence and to introduce them to something that’s in their backyard but in a way is still so far away - the ocean. MeWater is entirely run by volunteers and while it was founded in 2015 its benevolent roots can be traced back to lessons from Eddie’s mom, a single mother with a love for helping others.

Dive deeper: Check out Eddie in the documentary Fish People on Netflix.

MeWater Foundation and Eddie Donnellan

MeWater Foundation

Dr. Martin Haulena has always been fascinated with animal life. He remembers being a young boy and coming across a dead snake while walking with his grandma one day - together, they paid tribute to its life and laid flowers on the animal. The passion for marine mammals, specifically, came a bit later after he touched a dolphin for the first time on a family trip to Florida. Today, the head veterinarian at the Vancouver Aquarium, an Ocean Wise initiative, is one of the world’s leading specialists on marine mammal care and his work includes rescuing and rehabilitating wild animals as well as caring for those at the Aquarium, all while helping researchers along the way. The passion never wavers, but the one thing that has changed over the years? How his work increasingly fits into a bigger, growing conversation about how our actions impact all the species around us.

Dive deeper: Learn more about the Marine Mammal Rescue Centre and how you can help.

Vancouver Aquarium and Marine Mammal Rescue Centre

Vancouver Aquarium

Vancouver Aquarium and Marine Mammal Rescue Centre