Internationally renowned as the ambassador-at-large
to the world's oceans, Sylvia Earle is an extraordinary
woman--the former chief scientist of the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a distinguished
marine biologist, a veteran of more than 6,000 hours
underwater, the founder of an ocean engineering firm,
and an eloquent advocate for marine conservation. Sea
Change is at once the gripping adventure story of
Earle's three decades of undersea exploration, an
insider's introduction to the dynamic field of marine
biology, and an urgent plea for the preservation of the
world's fragile and rapidly deteriorating ocean
ecosystems.Earle takes us along on journeys to places of
unimaginable beauty and unutterable destruction. She
conjures up the exhilaration of swimming with humpback
whales off the coast of Maui; she makes us comprehend
the true environmental tragedy of the massive oil spills
in Prince William Sound and the Persian Gulf; and she
leads us out into Australia's Great Barrier Reef, the
epitome of ocean wilderness but also the final resting
place for tons of waste that drift in from thousands of
miles away. This brilliant, thought-provoking, superbly
readable book will inspire a new reverence for the
majesty of the world's oceans even as it opens our eyes
to the intricate interdependence of all
life-forms. |
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