Marine Debris Tracker for IOS & Android

Written by Jason Learned on 09 June 2012. Posted in Miscellaneous

Marine Debris Tracker is available now for iPhone, iPad and Android devices!

The Mobile App Marine Debris Tracker is a joint partnership of the NOAA Marine Debris Division and the Southeast Atlantic Marine Debris Initiative (SEA-MDI), located within the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Georgia. A primary goal of SEA-MDI is to use innovative technologies and unique expertise to add culturally relevant outreach tools and information to the current NOAA Marine Debris Division. Marine Debris Tracker is the first product of this initiative. It is our hope that it will spread awareness of marine debris, as well as serve as an easy to use and simple tool for marine debris data collection.

When paddling along the coast this is a great app to help NOAA track and document marine debris on the coast lines.

To see a map of already logged debris visit the Marine Debris Tracker Website.

Broken Group Archipelago

Written by Jason Learned on 03 June 2012. Posted in Journeys

It has been just a week since my return and I am already wishing I was back, actually I wish I never had to leave. This was my 3rd year in The Broken Group. Keith a fellow Firefighter from a neighboring district and friend of mine joined me again this year. We wanted to do something a little different from the norm. We decided to go with all fresh food, no dehydrated food allowed for this one. 

We set out making a meal plan. Disregard the fact that we are both Firefighters and like to cook, Keith actually has a cullinary background as a Chef. We had some limitations with our meal planning, we knew that water is limited in The Broken Group so we had to choose meals and foods that used less water.  We also counted on harvesting a fair share of seafood as appetizers. 

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Options for tracking your paddles

Written by Jason Learned on 14 May 2012. Posted in Miscellaneous

I get a lot of questions about what options people have to track their paddles. For starters, there is the old tried and true, paper journal and pencil which works for people who have not embraced the computer age. The simple answer is that there are no off the shelf programs designed to track our paddle advetures. I have however over the years come up a few solutions and have landed on one that works quite well for me.

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You never think it will happen to you. . .

Written by Jason Learned on 13 May 2012. Posted in Safety

Its inevitable, the more you do something that has an inherent risk the more likely you will find yourself in need of help. It finally happened to me on a beautiful northwest day out of Makah Bay on the Olympic Peninsula.

I was a student taking part in a 3 day BCU 4 Star Coastal Leadership Training. The training was Sat. thru Mon. however I left from work Friday morning and made a bee line straight fro the coast. The weather forecast was for clear skies, light NW winds, and a NW swell of 6-8’ and falling all weekend. I figured I would show up early and get to the beach to get a few hours of playing in the surf.

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