When Gallant Lady owner Jim Moran died a few months ago, many people in the marine industry, including me, felt a great gaping hole had just been left on Earth. Here was a man who was passionate about boats and was willing to share his love with just about anyone who asked. He was also passionate about being a responsible cruiser, leaving as little an impact as possible on the pristine environments he enjoyed.
So it was with great joy that I learned that the International SeaKeepers Society dedicated its engineering office and calibration lab in his honor. The nearly ten-year-old organization is a global network of not just yachtsmen like Moran but also scientists and others from all walks of life who are concerned about the sea. A number of megayachts as well as freighters and even government buoys are fitted with the SeaKeepers’ special equipment that captures data about the oceans.
The renamed Jim Moran SeaKeepers Laboratories in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, is the place where this equipment is made as well as where sensors are tested, adjusted, and validated. Jan Moran, Jim’s wife (flanked by vice chairman Alfred Balm and chairman Don Tomlin in the photo above), attended the dedication ceremony and pledged $50,000 to support the new SeaKiosk project. Just as its name implies, the SeaKiosk will be a booth-like structure where people can access information from the SeaKeeper monitoring systems as well as learn about the effect of things like rainfall and even hurricanes. The goal is to install these booths in public places like museums and visitor centers as well as aboard cruise ships and in schools and libraries.
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