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SHADES OF GRAY
I
ts not too early to mark your
calendar for the third Ocean Film
Festival scheduled to take place
Sept. 22-24 at Trustees Theater in
downtown Savannah and September
30 at the Ritz Theater in downtown
Brunswick.
The Ocean Film Festival has been
expanded this year to celebrate both
the 25th anniversary of Grays Reef
and the 30th anniversary of the
Sapelo Island Estuarine Research
Reserve. Both agencies are part of the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA), an
agency of the U.S. Department of
Commerce.
The tentative line up for the
Ocean Film Festival includes more
than 40 films. World renowned
whale researcher Roger Payne,
legendary diver and underwater
cinematographer Stan Waterman and
National Geographic documentary
filmmaker Kevin McCarey are among
the ocean filmmakers who will be
presenting. The Academy Award
winning film, Darwins Nightmare, is
also scheduled to be shown.
Look for a complete schedule of films
on the Grays Reef web site soon.
www.graysreef.noaa.gov
Lights,
Camera,


Oceans!
Lights,
Camera,


Oceans!
World, a multi-volume
encyclopedia
of marine life, for the
schools media center.
These volumes will
greatly enhance the
students understanding
of the marine world, said
Patricia Priestly, marine
science coordinator at the
school.
Thunderbolt Marine
Science Academy is the only marine
science magnet school in the
Chatham-Savannah School District.
SHADES OF GRAY
NOAA
s Grays Reef National Marine Sanctuary
VOLUME 3, NUMBER 2



Summer 2006
Continued on page 2
Celebrating 25 Years of Protecting An American Ocean Treasure
Happy Birthday to Grays Reef from
Thunderbolt Elementary Students
G
rays Reef
National Marine
Sanctuary staff
celebrated the
25th anniversary
of its designation
as a sanctuary on
January 26th with the
teachers and first graders
of Thunderbolt
Elementary Marine
Science Academy.
Grays Reef is forging a partnership
with the school to enrich marine
science education for Thunderbolts
650 students. To kick off the
partnership, Grays Reef presented
three framed educational posters
to the Thunderbolt Elementary
media center. Each classroom at
Thunderbolt also received a set
of educational posters from the
sanctuary. Grays Reef has also
purchased Aquatic Life of the
Grays Reef Prepares
Third Ocean Film Festival
for September
22, 23, 24 and 30
Thunderbolt first graders sing about fish and
alligators at the Grays Reef birthday party.
Grays Reef donated educational material to
Thunderbolt in honor of its 25th year as a
National Marine Sanctuary.
Charlea Nelson uses the Aquatic Life books
donated to Thunderbolt by Grays Reef. The Thunderbolt first graders
entertained at the anniversary
party with fishy music, songs and
dance. The Grays Reef staff served
birthday cake to the first graders.
Grays Reef staff will also be on
hand for Thunderbolts Big Splash
Daya day of hands-on marine
science education to be held before
the end of the school year.
For more information about the
Thunderbolt Elementary Academy,
call Pat Priestly at (912) 303-6655
or see http://www.savannah.
chatham.k12.ga.us/schools/
thunderbbolt/sccps.html
O
ur summer season is upon on
us and that means our research
cruises are already in prog-
ress aboard the NOAA Ship Nancy
Foster. Greg McFall is coordinating the
cruises and serving as chief scientist
and dive operations supervisor. He is
definitely a busy man. In mid- June,
our educator workshops with our
partner the Georgia Aquarium kick
into high gear. That means that Cathy
will be very busy leading 32 educa-
tors along with my colleague at the
Georgia Aquarium down the Altamaha
River Watershed from Atlanta to
Grays Reef for two weeks. The rest
of the staff has their hands full with
Ocean Film Festival preparations,
editing our website, preparing for our
big September anniversary event in
Atlanta, and much more.
Speaking of our anniversary, this year
marks our 25th year as a sanctuary
and we will be celebrating in a variety
of ways. Our big event will take place
on September 7th in Atlanta at the
Georgia Aquarium. At this event we
will honor Bernie Marcus, the bene-
factor of the Georgia Aquarium, for
his generous contribution to the state
of Georgia and the world in ocean
awareness. Marcus is the co-founder
of Home Depot, and he and his wife
Billie generously gave millions of their
own money to make the Aquarium a
reality. It is the largest in the world and
is quite impressive indeed. If you would
like an invitation to this fund-raising
event, let us know soon where to send
the invitation.
Later this summer our new manage-
ment plan is due to hit the streets,
so be on the look out for it. You can
find out all about our current and new
proposed regulations as well as our
research programs, education and out-
reach programs and much more on our
web site at www. graysreef.noaa.gov.
So dive into our web site or better yet
on the reef itself. If you happen to be
on Skidaway Island drop by our head-
quarters for a visit.
Have a wonderful summer!
Cathy and Greg
NOAAs Grays Reef National Marine Sanctuary

SHADES OF GRAY
2
From the
Sanctuary Managers
Editor
Gail Krueger
Acting Sanctuary Managers
Greg McFall
Cathy Sakas
Photography
All photos copyright GRNMS unless
otherwise noted
Line drawings
All line drawings copyright GRNMS
unless otherwise noted
Unless specically stated, the views
expressed in this issue do not
necessarily reect the opinions of the
Grays Reef National Marine Sanctuary,
the National Marine Sanctuary Program
or NOAA.
WE WELCOME COMMENTS AND WILL
CONSIDER PUBLICATION OF ITEMS
SUBMITTED BY READERS AS SPACE
PERMITS.
Comments and articles should be sent
to:
Gail Krueger
Gail.Krueger@noaa.gov
10 Ocean Science Circle
Savannah, GA 31411
GRAYS REEF STAFF
Acting Sanctuary Managers
Greg McFall
Cathy Sakas
Education Intern
Leah Cooling
Boat Captain
Scott Fowler
Operations Coordinator
Keith Golden
Intern
Jimmy Groover
Outreach Coordinator
Gail Krueger
Research Coordinator
Greg McFall
Administrative Coordinator
Debbie Meeks
Education Coordinator
Cathy Sakas
Planning Coordinator
Becky Shortland
Regional Projects Coordinator
Jim Sullivan
Printed on paper containing 60% recycled
content with 30% post-consumer waste, meeting
EPA federal minimum standards. Printed with
soy-based inks.
Continued from Happy Birthday to Grays Reef;
page 1
Becky Shortland, Planning Coordinator,
Greg McFall, Acting Sanctuary Manager and
Cathy Sakas, Acting Sanctuary Manager,
(left to right) celebrate Grays Reefs
birthday with Thunderbolt Elementary
principal Dr. Vicki Bryant. U
nderwater footage of Grays
Reef will go national this
fall thanks to a dive and film
team led by undersea explorer Fabien
Cousteau.
Fabien, grandson of famed
oceanographer Jacques Yves Cousteau,
has spent the last nine months
documenting all 13 marine sanctuaries
in the United States for his fathers
PBS series Jean-Michel Cousteau:
Ocean Adventures. The team spent a
few days in March at Grays Reefthe
only sanctuary they visited three times.
Footage from Grays Reef and each
of the sanctuaries will be featured in
a two-part episode called Americas
Underwater Treasures. The episode
will be narrated by actor Robert
Redford and is scheduled to air on
PBS in the fall. Another episode
of the multi-part, high definition
television series, Voyage to Kure aired
in April. That episode explored the
Northwestern Hawaiian Islands
archipelago, the most remote
island group in the world. The
area is on its way to becoming
the nations 14th national
marine sanctuary.
A visit from a film crew of this
caliber provides an opportunity
for many people to see a reef
that we already know is an
important piece of habitat.
The Grays Reef staff was very
excited to host the team.
The crew used the Grays Reef
research vessel Joe Ferguson for
three days of diving and filming.
At the end of the mission,
Fabien Cousteau ticked off a list
of ocean life they encountered
in just the final dive: an array
of angelfish, arrow crabs, and
sheepshead. They also spotted a
number of scour holes used by
threatened loggerhead turtles to
scrape barnacles off their shells.
We also swam through a school of
jellyfish, which was pretty fantastic, he
said.
Fabien Cousteau said the purpose
of the program is to showcase the
beauty of each of the 13 underwater
ecosystems, while at the same time
sounding the call to preserve them.
People may not even know they
have these marine parks for their own
enjoyment, he said. But its a finite
resource. Humans impact the oceans
every day. If the series can bring these
two themes together, then its done its
job.
Ocean Adventures harkens back to
Jacques Yves Cousteaus effort of 30
years ago when he first introduced
television audiences to the worlds
marine environment. Now,