Dr. Sylvia Earle Addresses Superyacht Owners

Dr. Sylvia Earle, an explorer in residence at the National Geographic Society and former chief scientist of NOAA, made an impassioned plea yesterday to megayacht owners, captains and crew.

“We are united in the common interest in the blue part,” Earle said, pointing to the oceans on a spaceshot of Earth. “I want to know how the power of megayachts might be used in a positive way. This is a community of people who already care.”

It must begin with awareness, she said.

“Sure, the problems are what we put in the oceans and what we take out,” Earle said. “But the biggest problem is to recognize that the oceans are in trouble.”

Kevin Hardy of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography seeks yachts to help his group deploy instruments to measure data at the sea bottom. He showed video of one of the small robotic machines he invented that, when dropped overboard, fall to the sea floor, record data, and floats back to the surface.

“Practically every time we do this, we discover a new creature,” hesaid.

Hardy has traveled to the ocean’s major trenches on every type of superyacht, boat, fishing trawlers to research vessels. The hard part is getting out to these areas, he said.

Fabian Cousteau, grandson of legendary marine explorer Jacques Cousteau, shared a sentiment from his grandfather, that people with interest and ability have an obligation to use them.

“It’s time we stopped living on this planet and start living with it,” Cousteau.

The scientific panel was sponsored by SeaKeepers International, a non-profit organization that fits superyachts with an ocean and atmospheric monitoring system, to bring researchers and yachts closer to their similar goals.

“What are we waiting for?” Earle asked. “We’ve been to the moon. Let’s send people to the ocean’s depths.”

Yachts have helicopters, she said, so why not more submersibles? Explore what is underneath the boat, she said.

She knows what’s underneath a yacht; Earle set a record for her dive in an atmospheric diving suit in 1979 (to 1,250′) and she holds the women’s record for a solo dive in a deep submersible (to 3,280′).

Yachts can be especially valuable for the opportunity they provide others to appreciate the oceans, she said, even by offering scuba diving. And when people know the waters more intimately, they will appreciate and care for them.

“Our ability to deplete resources is an an all time high,” Earle said. “But so is our ability to restore.”