Ua blue whale stores 33 tons of carbon dioxide per year. Only one. It does this thanks to the amount of phytoplankton it gulps down. She lives to be 90 (do the math). Then she dies, sinks to the bottom and stays there forever: he will never know the good he has done to us humans. That is: it has cushioned the impact of all those gases spilled into the atmosphere to the detriment of our climate (a tree, for example, stores only 22 kilos of CO2 in a year) while he lived peacefully in a place unknown to us, or at least less known for sure than the Moon.
It is the ocean, the world’s largest producer of oxygen, if not the only panacea for the Earth. Breathe, drink, heal, enlighten, move: all our activities depend on the sea and marks the chapters of Blu. An ocean of solutions (Cortina) a book to collect both for its images and for its predictions. If it no longer strikes you (we are addicted to tragic environmental balances) the news that in the oceans today only 10 percent of the large fish found in world waters in the 1950s survive (the fault of industrial fishing, rather than pollution), then make a note of this: our blood, as well as our brains, hearts, limbs and tears, have the same amount of salt as the ocean. We are linked forever, that’s it. But we forget it.
Blu by Maud Fontenoy and the photojournalist Yann Arthus-Bertrand.
The authors of the book – the navigator Maud Fontenoy and the photojournalist Yann Arthus-Bertrand – they use the weapon of amazement to remind us, listing all the “courtesies” that the ocean gives us.
Let’s say thanks to the Ocean for:
1) Azt, the drug used to treat AIDS, comes from herring.
2) By reproducing the glue produced by mussels we could replace the formaldehyde which is toxic and also use it in the surgical field to repair damaged tissues (preventing abortions).
3) Fast-growing wild minnows could, according to FAO, help us eradicate hunger in the world.
4) With the hemoglobin (which is universal!) Of a marine worm (arenicola), which has a blood 40 times more oxygenating than that of humans, today we avoid the intubation of patients with respiratory difficulties and we could save many people in waiting for transplant (in addition to those who have contracted the coronavirus).
We could continue if it weren’t for the fact that you find everything in the book, to be read only after this interview. After a long wait Fontenoy, 44 years old and four children, navigator known for the feats accomplished both rowing and sailing alone, and president of the Maud Fontenoy Foundationwhich works in schools for the protection of the oceanshe replied.
Maud Fontenoy (press office)
Your personal story is already a book, isn’t it?
I have spent more than half of my life on the oceans. I first embarked when I was seven days on the family boat, and I have always loved the sea so passionately. Through my adventures I have tried to grasp the challenges that until then had only been overcome by men. I tried to show that everything is possible: you don’t need big arms, just great willpower. If I managed it, rowing alone and without assistance, anyone can do it.
Why did he write Blu?
It’s my 26th book on the sea. I would like to encourage everyone to protect him. Wherever our home is, we will be inextricably linked: the “big blue” is our ultimate challenge, that’s what the book is about.
A great challenge for everyone
A useful challenge to protect us humans too.
Of course, it is the reason why I always like to tell how scientists are inspired by our oceans to find solutions. Let’s take shark skin for example. It happens that every year about 120 million sharks are killed only for their fins, but at the same time there is a start-up that was inspired by the skin of this animal that has the particularity of preventing bacteria from adhering to them. it happens that this new coating goes to cover the interiors of our hospitals to avoid the proliferation of diseases. Terrific, isn’t it?
A politician you would give your book to?
To President Macron: I hope he makes ocean conservation a great national cause.
A work of art that comes closest to the power and mystery of the ocean.
I love it very much The intoxicated boat, a poem by Arthur Rimbaud. I think of the lines “The storm smiled at my awakenings at sea / Lighter than a cork I danced on the waves / Which are called eternal wounders of victims / Ten nights, without regretting the insipid eye of the headlights!”
In another life it will be …
Maybe in Italy. I live in Nice and go there often. I like the warmth, beauty and cultural richness of your country: I could very well live there. More than the place, however, for me in reality something else counts: my family. It is the backbone of my life. So if only I moved with them, I would go anywhere, in any case never far from the sea. What work would I do? Teacher at school. I really enjoy educating children.
The fragility of the sea
When she is alone in the middle of the sea, how does Maud Fontenoy feel?
The happiness of being able to look at the mainland from afar as if it were an author’s painting: the farther you are, the more you appreciate it. But loneliness remains, the hardest thing to live with, even if it was your choice. In these moments you realize that we are all gregarious, viscerally linked to each other. When you leave and remain alone for over five months, you can’t help but think about life, in your place, about what you want to do when you come back. Storms make you humble.
What do you teach your children?
My children are between three and thirteen years old. We are careful with everything we buy. They don’t have plastic toys. Every day we talk about how to protect the ocean: they are my first ambassadors!
What is the ocean for you?
One person, always. I owe him the blood running through my veins. Sometimes he is very masculine, meaning brutal during storms. Sometimes more maternal: it happens when I remember children or when I am lucky enough to observe exceptional sunsets in the middle of the Pacific.
Saving a whale means saving the work that 1500 trees would do for our survival. How can we make our small contribution on vacation?
Use a sunscreen that has the words “Ocean protect”, you will protect the ecosystems near the coasts. Solar oil creates a film on the surface of the water and prevents photosynthesis. Everything that has to do with our climate, renewable energy sources, our health and our dreams is there, right before our eyes. The big blue must be defended, and our selfishness is the enemy.
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