Hello Barbados… by Tom McMahon – Deckhand aboard Sea Dragon. We have arrived in Barbados! And in doing so we have sailed from one side of the Atlantic ocean to the other. So I think a quick recap of the passage itself is in order and then a roundup of […]
Read MoreRecently, Yachtmaster Ocean and Yachtmaster instructor Emily Caruso joined us on the SV Sea Dragon, and with a crew of marine scientists and environmentalists sailed from Senegal to Guyana, crossing the Atlantic Ocean. A very wise man once told me that there are two kinds of sailors: those who have been […]
Read MoreWe are part of a greater system – not above, beyond and outside it. If the ocean flounders, so will we. It’s environmental preservation, but self-preservation too. So go outside. Breathe the air. Taste the water. Go on a mini (or a massive) adventure. We cannot protect what we do not love and we cannot love what we do not feel connected to, so that’s my advice and that is what I am taking from Project Ocean 2015.
Read MoreAt six people, we’re a rather small crew for this boat, and our four-hour shifts make me feel like a newborn baby — constantly put to bed and soon awoken abruptly, given food and drink, and thrust from my cocoon of a hammock-bed into a precarious waterworld above, strapped to the ship by a safety leash. But the crew is healthy and able, the weather’s been gorgeous, playful-seeming dolphins dance along the boat during the day, and magical-seeming bioluminescence dances along at night, and there’s no sign of human life in any direction.
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The crew have settled well into the rhythm of life on board, with watchkeeping, rest, trawling, cooking, cleaning, and keeping Sea Dragon running smoothly. We have continued our twice daily trawls off the stern, and our scientist Adam is pleased with the results. He’s collecting enough data to keep him busy in the laboratory at Exeter University over the long winter months.
Read MoreThe latest estimate of plastics afloat in our seas and oceans is put at 5.25 trillion pieces, weighing in at 250,000 tonnes. That, coupled with the fact that over 260 marine related species are known to be ingesting plastics from our oceans, and well documented evidence on the impacts of this ingestion on a wide variety of marine animals including zooplankton, makes man’s legacy a dirty one. However, it is not too late! We can change things.
Read MoreSea Dragon slipped her mooring lines at 1230 this afternoon to start the latest Pangaea expedition, the Gyre to Gaia II, from Horta to Lanzarote in the Canaries. The distance is about 980 miles and should take us about 7 days.
Read MoreAnd this is what lies at the heart of Panagea Explorations, taking ordinary people out to sea, to witness and research the growing problem of marine plastic debris. And this is what lies at the heart of Selfridges’ exhibition also. A concept model of Sea Dragon is surrounded by five beautifully designed items, each of which are representations of the five ocean gyres, by artist duo Studio Swine.
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This post originally appeared on the ONCA blog here. By Laura Coleman, Onca Director There are cycles to this planet. We learn about them in school. Rock, carbon, water and nitrogen; they all flow in beautiful circles. But there’s something else that flows too. Waste. More specifically plastic, in the […]
Read MoreOur oceans are full of plastic, and fragments of fishing nets, bottle lids, microbeads and cotton buds are some of the most dangerous things that lurk in the deep. Yesterday was the first in a series of events this summer run by Selfridges Project Ocean, the Zoological Society London and a host of other amazing partners in the Ultralounge at Selfridges, in an effort to rethink the stories we tell ourselves about plastic.
Read MoreNothing more shocking than feeling as if you are in the most remote part of the planet, and yet, seeing evidence of our footprint float by every day.
Read MoreAfter a great day of sailing and our last supper of our haute cuisine, we got – as a final touch – a little bird playing around in the last lights of the sunset. Now the sun made place again for the twilight that will slowly take us to our last ocean night with stars above us, leading the way, and lights underneath us in the water, carrying the boat back to land to Horta, Azores, Portugal.
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