A new ocean sanctuary; then, freediving

Guests: Matt Rand and James Nestor

President Obama announced plans last week to create the world’s largest marine preserve in the Pacific Ocean. The Pacifica Remote Island Marine National Monument would grow to 782,000 square miles and protect the area’s atolls and reefs which are home to dozens of species of marine mammals, sharks, endangered sea turtles and schools of tuna. We start off this hour talking about the sanctuary with MATT RAND, Director of the Pew Charitable Trusts’ Global Ocean Legacy project. Then, we plunge into the extreme sport of freediving with writer JAMES NESTOR. Nestor, a recreational freediver, investigates this growing, dangerous sport in his book Deep: Freediving, Renegade Science, and What the Ocean Tells Us about Ourselves.