Celebrating World Oceans Day at the Mississippi Aquarium

It’s World Oceans Day, a time we take each year to learn more about the conservation efforts to protect our blue planet.

World Oceans Day at the Mississippi Aquarium has become one of the more popular educational events on the Coast. Carley Zapfe, assistant manager of visitor programs and interpretation, says it’s a big hit every year. “The reception has been really great. It’s been a really impactful message; we love being able to make those connections with our guests on what they could be doing at home in order to be helping our oceans. You know 71 percent of the earth is covered in water. 96 percent of that is all held in our ocean basins. So, we wanna make sure we fill all of our aspects of ocean care. Not just keeping it clean but also making sure that our animals are happy and healthy as well.”

This year, the Mississippi Aquarium will be partnering with the United States Coast Guard to promote more conservation awareness. Flotilla Commander Derrick Chairbonnet said, “One of the major missions of the United States Coast Guard  and the Coast Guard auxiliary is marine safety. And that is everything from invasive species to environmental damage to pollution and we’re here for outreach to tell people about that mission and inform people about those kind of problems.”

The Mississippi Aquarium is excited to extend its World Oceans Day to this Saturday, where they’re able to celebrate with a larger audience, exposing their guests to the world of oceanography and its conservation efforts. “We’re going to be having some activities on campus of course. We always promote conservation in all of our messaging. It’s one of our pillars here at the Aquarium and we want to make sure we continue that forward.”