The Papahanaumokuakea Marine Debris Project has removed over 250 tons of trash from remote Northwestern Hawaiian islands since 2020, mostly ghost nets tangling coral reefs. Teams spend 30 days at sea per mission, using drones and GPS to locate debris in one of the world's most ecologically valuable marine sanctuaries.
Questions this video answers
About 1,200 miles.
70% of all the coral reefs in the United States.
About 7,000 species and 23 endangered species.
14 million seabirds.
An estimated 57 tons per year.
Chapters
Papahanamokukea is the most incredible place on the planet. It's a string of uninhabited islands and atolls that stretches for about 1200 miles to the northwest of the main Hawaiian islands. This place is so remote that if there ever was a place on the planet that shouldn't suffer from human generated trash, it is Papahanamukukea. But unfortunately, it suffers from an outside impact. I first visited as a researcher collecting data on the marine debris and the plastic pollution that we found there. I was shocked at what I saw. I knew I had to dedicate my life to getting this work done. This issue is directly related to human activity and the choices we make. And so this is absolutely something we can do something about.
Papahana Mokuake is the most isolated archipelago in the entire world. It's pristine, raw, wild Papa Hanaumokua Keo.
Is a marine national monument. But it has always been a special place to our people. As a native Hawaiian, it is literally a genealogical tie. It's the land of Arakua, the gods.
It holds 70% of all the coral reefs in the United States. 7,000 species, 23 endangered species, 14 million seabirds. It's one of those rare places where you can go and the wildlife may have never seen a human. When you put all that together, you have one of the most special and unique places on the planet.
The two biggest impacts to Papahana Mookuake and marine environments all over the world are climate change and marine debris. An estimated 57 tons of marine debris accumulates in Papahana Mokuake each year.
It's hard to explain what marine debris is, but if you can imagine taking your trash every single day and just dumping it on your front porch, essentially that's what it's going to look like over time with nobody picking it up.
What breaks my heart most is how little people seem to know about it. I mean, plastic is an item we use all the time. It's everywhere.
By 2050, scientists predict that there will be more plastic by weight in the ocean than fish.
Based on our geographic location in the Pacific, the majority of what we clean up is debris from the fishing industry. So that's ghost nets.
Ghost nets are abandoned or derelict commercial fishing gear made up of high density polyethylene material that's meant to last forever, even long after it's been discarded in the ocean. It's going to continue to ghost fish, continue to catch invertebrates, fish, mammals, and then eventually snag and smother a living coral reef.
Animals get caught and you only have a Little bit of time to free them or they are basically doomed to this net. We have to do something about it now.
Growing up, the ocean provided for me, my family. It's a big part of who I am. I want to be able to preserve the ocean and all that it provides for the future generations. Kevin and I have been partners in crime for a very long time. We work together at NOAA to manage and lead the debris removal operations in Papahana Mokuakea.
But it got to the point where the money was dwindling. So we put our heads together to start a new nonprofit, the Papahana Mokuakea Marine Debris Project. Now that we operate as a nonprofit, we're able to fundraise from many different channels that were unavailable to us under the government. PMDP is my baby. I've had my fair share of frayed nerves in order to make this happen. But at the end of the day, I believe in what we're doing and that this work will provide a better future.
Papahanal mokuakea takes up 75% of the Hawaiian archipelago. It essentially spans half of the United States. And with such a large area to tackle, efficiency is the name of the game. So we use advanced technologies to increase our operational efficiency. Preparing for these trips is a year round endeavor.
Planning is key because it means we're able to hit or survey and clean spots that really need it.
We use geographic information systems and we use this to map out our operations.
For the days we can overlay all the data from our past cleanups and identify hot spots. And with such a large area to cover, being able to do this with technology before we go out there makes such a huge difference.
Our field missions last about 30 days at sea at a time.
In the morning before we go, we do Oli, which is chance. And this is to call out to our ancestors and set a positive intention. It's mainly a sign of respect. When you go to someone's house, you're not just going to walk in, you're going to knock on the door, you're going to give them your name and you're going to let them know that you're bringing a positive intention into their house.
We charter a 180 foot ship to get us up to these areas where we work. It's really important for our team to take this hands on approach because at the end of the day, it's actually the only way we can address this problem.
Papahana Mokuikea is a couple hundred miles northwest of Kauai. It takes five Days just to get to our work site.
When we get out there, we see marine debris, either new floating at the surface or we see it fully embedded in these reef systems.
It still amazes me how big these ghost nets can get and the amount of damage it does. This is why this work has to get done.
This operation is in many ways somewhat dangerous. We're operating in the open ocean with heav equipment, with ships, with boats. We're holding our breath and diving down to the bottom of the ocean around entanglement hazards. You might spend hours or in some cases days, cutting a net to the point where you can actually remove it.
When we're in Papahanaumokuakea, we speak for the wildlife. They're fighting for survival.
We use drones to detect nets on the reef. That significantly cuts down our time doing swim surveys, and that will allow us to be out there longer and pick up more nets. When you find one, there's such a rush. You're like, yes, I got one.
When the ship pulls back into the port with the pile of debris, you feel that scale of the work that we do. That's when it really hits home that we're having an impact. PMDP is needed now more than ever because we're really at a tipping point with many of our marine ecosystems. Myself, James, the rest of the team, we think like ecopreneurs in the sense that we want to make this better while maintaining focus on our bottom line, which is the conservation work that we do. Our first large scale cleanup happened in the fall of 2020. And since then we've run five cleanup missions. We've removed more than 250 tons from these ecosystems. Marc Benioff's taken us under his wing, which has been amazing and really allowed us to take this project to the next level. As we've scaled up over the last three years, our impact has scaled up as well. PMDP aims to remove 100 tons in 2023 and 150 tons in 2024 and beyond.
Successfully cleaning a reef is an unbelievable feeling. You see the fish swarm back to their home. You see a blank reef that could be repopulated with new coral. This work keeps everybody hopeful.
It is very humbling to see creatures that know what we're there to do is with positive intention.
Making positive change requires action. In fact, it's the only way anything gets done. You know, I have a five year old daughter and I always think what the oceans will look like when she's my age. So I do it for a better future.
The ocean is an incredibly special place. She is our blue heart, and we need to protect her. When people care, change is possible.
It's my hope that we're able to develop ocean stewards, people that are going to be conservationists, and they're going to take care of this planet.
I do this, I just work for my people, my kupuna, the generations to come. Our kupuna did things in a simple way. Malama aina. You know, you take care of land, takes care of you.
There's an old Hawaiian proverb, humanity is united by the ocean. And I really think that's true. We're protecting Papahanamo Kuakea, not just for the people of Hawaii, but for everyone on the planet. Sam.
