Surfin’ Safari

Raincoast Conservation Foundation has an exciting project in the works with our friends at Patagonia, a leader among environmentally-minded businesses.

Striving to alert more people about plans to impose tar sands pipelines and oil tankers on British Columbia’s central and north coast via the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway project, how could we inform the people of California, for instance, as they are expected to be one of the primary recipients of this crude oil?

It came to Raincoast’s surfing science director Dr. Chris Darimont while immersed in the water, literally. Why couldn’t surfers – the closest approximation of marine mammals among we humans – bring voice to this issue on behalf of whales, dolphins, porpoises and other species that would be at risk from a catastrophic oil spill on Canada’s Pacific coast?  An idea for a documentary film and new outreach initiative was born.

A version of this article was first published in the Seaside Times March 2012 Issue

You can help

Raincoast’s in-house scientists, collaborating graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and professors make us unique among conservation groups. We work with First Nations, academic institutions, government, and other NGOs to build support and inform decisions that protect aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, and the wildlife that depend on them. We conduct ethically applied, process-oriented, and hypothesis-driven research that has immediate and relevant utility for conservation deliberations and the collective body of scientific knowledge.

We investigate to understand coastal species and processes. We inform by bringing science to decision-makers and communities. We inspire action to protect wildlife and wildlife habitats.