Customer Reviews

Blue Frontier: Dispatches from America's Ocean Wilderness

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David Helvarg has done a great service for all who cherish the ocean, by showing the devastation mankind has done, is doing, and unfortunately will continue doing (in less the masses become educated on just what is happening) to all the life forms in this realm. It's not all "downer" reading, but also David gives us glimmers of "hope", and some practical solutions for positive change. This book couldn't have been revised at a better time, as of this week (!0/29 thru 11/4) a major study published in the November 3 issue of the journal Science, published by AAAS, the nonprofit science society, warns that the world's wild-caught seafood fisheries could collapse by 2048 if current commercial fishing patterns continue. This is no surprise to anyone who's read David's work. Thanks again David Helvarg for writing such an important book, and also for your tireless conservation mission for the world's oceans.

There is so much solid, worthwhile information in this book, including valuable insights in why Western political interests are undermining proper representation of our national oceans, coasts, and Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) in Congress, that I would urge those interested in the oceans (hugely more important to our future than the Amazon or globla forestry, just to make the point), to buy this book, suffer its limitations, and ultimately benefit from the wisdom and experience of the author, for whom my respect is unqualified and whole-hearted. In passing, it would probably be helpful if the first thing we all demanded was that EEZ stand for Exclusive Environmental Zone, rather than treating the oceans as a for-profit target area.

There is one other information-related observation I would make that emerged from reading this book: both the United Nations and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) are clearly doing heroic and deeply important work vital to the future of the oceans--and they are doing a terrible job of communicating the basic information about the oceans and their work to the larger world of voters and concerned citizens. What really came home to me as I reflected on what to emphasize in this review is that there is a very wide, almost impenetratable, barrier between what the UN and NOAA know, and what is being communicated to the citizens who have the right to know (they paid for that information with their tax dollars) and the need to know and the desire to know. From this I would say that the next big step for those who would seek to save the oceans, is to demand that all UN and US Government information paid for by the taxpayer be put online henceforth, available at no further cost to the public. It is this information, the bullets and beans of the information war between corporate and citizen interests, that will decide the future of the oceans.

David Helvarg provides an accurate look at the changing nature of our oceans that is sometimes scary but also hopeful. In this updated version of the original hard copy, Helvarg's tales of the sea are very exciting as he goes off shore and below the surface with the Navy, scientists, explorers and even BP before and after their outrageous - yet totally predictable - deepwater spill in 2010. The recent updates on the oil spill, the politics of ocean policy and so much more make this Kindle version worth the purchase.
It's interesting that David Helvarg also has become an ocean advocate himself founding his own non-profit Blue Frontier Campaign. I guess he still has hope. Come to think of it after downloading and reading Blue Frontier - the updated 10th anniversary edition, so do I.
A great read!