Hope spots on a pale blue dot
Air, temperature, food and water, all things that any astronaut will explain, are vital life support tools, essential suitcase items for any journey into the cold dead big black. The astronaut Joe Allen once described how he needed to learn, to the finest detail, all that he could about his life support system, every stitch and rivet, every flashing light and dial, in order to have the capability to do everything in his power to take care of it and survive, famously pointing at the pristine cyan orb pirouetting beneath him during one mission, simply saying, “life support system.”
Pale blue dot image Voyager 1
Captain Paul Watson, founder of Sea Shepherd, puts a different spin on the same observation when he likens earth to a spaceship, hurtling through the universe with its own biospheric life support system, he observes that “we are just glorified passengers, the crew that run this ship are the important ones, and that's the bacteria, the worms, the insects and fish”. He goes on to explain that we need that crew in order to survive, they don't need us. On Valentines day 1990, four billion miles from Watson’s spaceship, on the edge of the solar system, another craft had been tossed into the obsidian void towards infinity with no means of return, at the event horizon of camera failure, Voyager 1 opened its aperture and fluttered its shutter for a final visual scientific task, history’s most expensive selfie. Amongst the bejewelled pitch, a precious watery gem glimmered, our home, scientist Carl Sagan perfectly described its humble and unique fragility as a “Pale blue dot” in his book of the same name he muses “That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives … on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.” Our life support system is dependent on this plaid cerulean, our fate along with the oceans are one.
Sylvia in JIM suit
Encouraged by her parents to be guided by curiosity and to show empathy to all living things, Sylvia Earle spent her early days exploring the woodland and wildlife that surrounded the small farm near Camden, New Jersey. At the age of twelve a decision was made for the family to move to Dunedin in Florida, the new family ‘Sunshine State’ home was perfect for Sylvia, this was an idyllic waterfront property that gave her instant access to the marine ecosystems of the Gulf of Mexico, she could now fully submerge, become a sponge and absorb her new ocean environment. After graduating from Florida State University in 1955, where she also learnt to scuba dive, Sylvia following her heart and remained close to the ocean, she focused her studies on seaweed (algae), collecting and alalysing 20,000 samples so as to complete and publish her dissertation, Phaeophyta of the Eastern Gulf of Mexico, gaining herself a Ph.D. The years ahead were consumed in a whirlpool of innovative research and astonishing groundbreaking exploration, these adventures belonged in the screenplays of B-movies and between the pages of science fiction comic books, TV and magazine articles began to circulate articles that bore all the hallmarks of an expensive and elaborate hoax, but it was all very real.
In 1970 Sylvia led the first all-female team of aquanauts as part of the Tektite 2 experiment. Built by the General Electric Company and partly funded by NASA, the Tektite scheme was the first scientist-in-the-sea experiment, an underwater habitat that allowed scientists to carry out marine research whilst living on the ocean floor. Resembling two fat white grain silos, this ambitious fabricated habitat was lowered 50 feet below the waves of Lameshur bay in the Virgin Islands, it was completely unheard of for women to be given such responsibilities in the world of scientific endeavour, a U.S female astronaut was still thirteen years away. This was treacherous and unchartered territory, yes, prior to Sylvia, men had spent time in the habitat, but it was Sylvia’s solid reputation as a leader, engineer and scientist, combined with her driving vision and never give up attitude that assembled an all female crew. Spending several weeks in these squat subaquatic pods was a claustrophobes worst nightmare and the team had to be chosen with military detail, the physical and mental strains were very closely monitored, this was as much an experiment into the viability of endurance living in a subaquatic artificial structure, as it was a marine research expedition, opening never before gained opportunities for extended dive times to study rippling sandy plains and swaying seagrass beds, brittle coral reefs and the diurnal and nocturnal behaviours of a wide variety of marine life.
Keeping one's cool whilst working in such dangerous and highly restricted circumstances takes a certain mindset, it requires a shakable calm and the ability to remain focused under intense pressure. Sylvia’s unique experiences with the Tektite programme had laid the groundwork for what was to be her most dangerous and trailblazing adventure yet. It was off the coast of Oahu, Hawaii, in 1979 that Sylvia stepped into the JIM suit, an atmospheric diving suit resembling a cross between a regular space suit and Robbie the robot from the movie Forbidden planet, it works by maintaining pressure at one atmosphere within the suit, doing away with special gas mixtures and therefore reducing the risk of nitrogen narcosis and decompression sickness. The armoured JIM suit containing Sylvia was strapped to a research submersible and craned from the ships deck, slowly bubbling out air to gain weight.
The canary yellow of the submersible slowly dissolved through ever deepening shades of green as it embarked upon its free fall from the sunlight zone, the sunken darkness ascended from beneath until final contact with the ocean floor was made, 381 metres down, the twilight zone. Here Sylvia untethered herself from the vessel and for two hours explored solo at a depth no human had ever been before, she later described some of what she witnessed “There was a forest floor of corals that looked like giant bed springs, I concentrated on these bioluminescent spirals of black-and-white-banded bamboo coral that bioluminesced when you touched them. They sent rings, like little glowing donuts of light shooting out from where you touched them - if you touched it near the bottom the light ascended, if you touched it near the top the light descended all the way to the base of the coral.”
A lot has changed throughout the oceans of the world, in 1947 when Sylvia was a child growing up in Florida, the number of offshore oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico totalled one, today the gulf has over 30,000 drill sites, catastrophic spills seem to be increasingly common place, at the latest count the planet has 400 ocean dead zones due to agricultural pollution. Nearly half of all coral reefs have disappeared due to climate change, our consumption of wildlife from the ocean is through the roof, we have now eaten 90% of the oceans big fish, there are countries still Whaling! Yet in Sylvia one always finds hope, in a recent interview, when questioned about her vision for the future of our seas she replied with a call to action:
“I wish you would use all means at your disposal, films! Expeditions! The web! More! To ignite public support for a global network of marine protected areas, hope spots large enough to save and restore the ocean, the blue heart of the planet”
The pioneer spirit and groundbreaking research of Sylvia Earle kicked open the door of the dusty and pompous scientific institutions of the mid/late twentieth century. She took fearless risks with a shrug and a smile, her legacy for countless female scientists, explorers and visionaries endures to this day and will continue to do so well into the future. Her mantra, to devote her life towards inspiring positive action to save the oceans of planet earth, is one we should all chant, her tireless and buoyant dedication, her deep passion and wisdom, her grit and humble determination is simply exhilarating, if there is a hope spot out there, then its wherever there is a Sylvia Earle.