WEBVTT 00:00:06.697 --> 00:00:13.060 So, I am Kelley Elliott. I work with NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research as an expedition manager. 00:00:13.918 --> 00:00:16.980 So right now, I am on board the NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer. 00:00:17.796 --> 00:00:25.850 Okeanos is actually the nation's first and only federal ship with the mission to explore the ocean for the purpose of discovery and the advancement of knowledge. 00:00:26.050 --> 00:00:32.970 It's a very exciting mission and we're conducting our ocean exploration activities here in the Johnston Atoll Unit, 00:00:33.170 --> 00:00:37.760 which is one of several units of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument. 00:00:40.261 --> 00:00:45.480 Work by NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer here in the Johnston Atoll Unit actually first began in 2015. 00:00:45.680 --> 00:00:52.720 We had two cruises that focused on collecting seafloor mapping data and doing remotely operated vehicle dives on some of the seamounts. 00:00:52.920 --> 00:00:57.230 And in 2017, this year, we've come back to continue and to build on that effort, 00:00:57.430 --> 00:01:03.900 to map new seamounts and to collect additional data about the habitats that reside on these seamounts. 00:01:07.686 --> 00:01:15.010 I'm Chris Kelley and I'm with the University of Hawaii School of Ocean and Earth Science Technology, and I'm a deepwater biologist. 00:01:28.260 --> 00:01:32.790 We are surveying this seamount which has never before explored. 00:01:32.990 --> 00:01:38.660 There's never before been any work on this location and we are seeing it for the first time, live. 00:01:40.249 --> 00:01:48.450 Some of the really unique things that we found on this expedition, at least to me, are new species. 00:01:49.466 --> 00:01:51.570 Whoa! What is it doing?! 00:01:51.770 --> 00:01:53.670 Look at this! Huh. 00:01:55.182 --> 00:01:58.690 I'm a sponge-o-phile. I'm a guy who likes deep-sea sponges, 00:01:58.890 --> 00:02:08.550 and about midway through this cruise, we came across a sponge that I have never seen before, and that was really exciting for me. 00:02:08.750 --> 00:02:18.650 We saw a fish and it's in the family Liparidae and Bruce Mundy was on the teleconference line when we came across that fish, 00:02:18.850 --> 00:02:24.400 and Bruce is a pretty conservative kind of guy and you could tell he was really excited, 00:02:24.600 --> 00:02:27.830 as we all were, because this was such a weird fish. 00:02:29.180 --> 00:02:31.430 I think nobody on Earth has seen this fish before and 00:02:31.630 --> 00:02:39.770 I think those who are watching right now are getting a first glimpse of a species that nobody has ever seen, certainly not alive before and probably never, ever. 00:02:42.498 --> 00:02:49.670 So, new species are always a big thrill, but the other things that excited me about this cruise is 00:02:49.870 --> 00:02:59.980 we hadn't really found very many high-density communities in the first expedition to this monument unit in 2015. 00:03:00.622 --> 00:03:07.330 And, I was concerned about this, but we decided to give it another shot on this particular cruise. 00:03:07.530 --> 00:03:15.240 We found at least four, and I think possibly five, of what I would describe as high-density communities here, all different. 00:03:17.833 --> 00:03:23.660 We had one that was filled with precious corals that we saw on the slopes of Johnston Atoll. 00:03:23.860 --> 00:03:29.480 Then we find an amazing forest of bamboo corals. 00:03:31.942 --> 00:03:37.130 A few days ago, we saw what we call the Land of the Weird Sponges. 00:03:37.330 --> 00:03:44.070 Just this amazing community of very, very strange animals that look like an alien planet. 00:03:47.716 --> 00:03:56.340 High-density coral and sponge communities are really important because they provide shelter and places to live for all types of different animals. 00:04:01.986 --> 00:04:08.350 So deep-sea coral and sponge communities are particularly important because they provide habitat and protection for many other animals. 00:04:09.248 --> 00:04:11.760 Some of these corals are also particularly long-lived. 00:04:11.960 --> 00:04:16.760 They can be as old as several hundreds of years or even several thousands of years old. 00:04:21.836 --> 00:04:27.570 I firmly believe that there are a lot of things that exist in the deep sea that are worth protecting. 00:04:27.770 --> 00:04:33.780 But, I have experience in the deep sea. A lot of other people don't have experience in the deep sea. 00:04:34.491 --> 00:04:37.310 And you can't care about anything that you don't know about. 00:04:37.510 --> 00:04:41.360 You can't care about anything if you don't even know it exists. 00:04:42.131 --> 00:04:52.300 So one of the things we're trying to do here is essentially illuminate what's down in the deep sea, and to get the public to care about it. 00:04:52.500 --> 00:04:59.360 So one of our goals is to engage and educate the public in telepresence-based exploration. 00:05:00.237 --> 00:05:04.540 And this is all just part of an effort to get the public interested and excited and 00:05:04.740 --> 00:05:09.150 be more knowledgeable about some of the deep-sea environments that reside on this planet. 00:05:10.697 --> 00:05:13.320 People need to see something before they believe it exists. 00:05:13.520 --> 00:05:18.150 I can't go up to you and just tell you that there's some great creatures in the deep sea, 00:05:18.350 --> 00:05:21.050 and you'll go, "Oh, that's fine. That's great. Hmm." 00:05:21.250 --> 00:05:25.830 But if I show you pictures and I show you video of what's down there, 00:05:26.030 --> 00:05:35.730 then I think you're gonna start to care about these animals and actually be interested in protecting them.