Ted Danson, Kate Walsh & Sam Waterston to Join Coastal Leaders in Washington to Urge President Obama to Abandon Atlantic Drilling
Oceana’s Coastal Voices Summit Will Bring Together Atlantic Leaders United Against Offshore Drilling and Seismic Airgun Blasting
Press Release Date: January 19, 2016
Location: Washington, D.C.
Contact:
Dustin Cranor, APR | email: dcranor@oceana.org | tel: 954.348.1314
Ted Danson, Kate Walsh and Sam Waterston will join coastal leaders in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, January 26 to urge President Obama to abandon his plan to open the Atlantic Ocean to industrial offshore drilling for the first time in U.S. history. Oceana’s Coastal Voices Summit will bring together Atlantic leaders united against offshore drilling and seismic airgun blasting, and will take place as the Obama administration prepares to release its updated proposals for these activities.
WHO:
- Ted Danson, Actor, Ocean Advocate and Oceana Board Member
- Alan Grayson, (D-FL), U.S. House of Representatives
- Jared Huffman, (D-CA), U.S. House of Representatives
- Queen Quet, Chieftess, Gullah/Geechee Nation
- Mark Sanford, (R-SC), U.S. House of Representatives
- Jacqueline Savitz, Vice President for U.S. Oceans, Oceana
- Kate Walsh, Actress and Ocean Advocate
- Sam Waterston, Actor, Ocean Advocate and Oceana Board Member
- Local and State Elected Officials
- Business Leaders and Fishing Representatives
- Local Activists and Youth Leaders
WHEN:
Tuesday, January 26, 2016
Press Scrum from 6:45 to 7:00 p.m.
Main Event from 7:00 to 8:00 p.m.
WHERE:
Jack Morton Auditorium
School of Media and Public Affairs, The George Washington University
805 21st Street, NW (approximately two blocks from Foggy Bottom Metro station)
NOTE:
Please RSVP to Dustin Cranor at dcranor@oceana.org
Background:
While the Department of the Interior considers opening a large swath of the Atlantic to offshore drilling, spanning from Virginia to Georgia, opposition continues to mount. As of today, nearly 100 East Coast municipalities, 100 Members of Congress, more than 660 state and local elected officials, and over 750 business interests have all publically opposed offshore drilling, citing threats to marine life, coastal communities and local economies. Along the Atlantic coast, nearly 1.4 million jobs and over $95 billion in gross domestic product rely on healthy ocean ecosystems, mainly through fishing, tourism and recreation.
Seismic airgun blasting, a process used to search for oil and gas deposits deep below the ocean floor, also continues to move forward in an area twice the size of California, stretching all the way from Delaware to Florida. In March, 75 leading marine scientists sent a letter to President Obama on the impacts of seismic airgun blasting in the Atlantic Ocean, stating that “the magnitude of the proposed seismic activity is likely to have significant, long-lasting, and widespread impacts on the reproduction and survival of fish and marine mammal populations in the region, including the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale, of which approximately only 500 remain.”
To watch Oceana’s short video about the growing opposition to Atlantic drilling, please visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfugAV7BWoE.
For more information, please visit www.StopTheDrill.org.
