Ocean You Glad You Survived? By Paul Tough

“The Finest Hours” is “the true story of a heroic sea rescue.” Not one, but two T2 Tankers split in half during one of the biggest nor'easters the Coast Guard had ever seen. More than 80 seamen were stranded aboard the two massive vessels. However, the rescue, surprisingly, comes down to a group of coasties from Chatham, MA. Bernie, a 24 year old coasty, and his crew knowingly volunteer to go out into the perilous seas to try to rescue them, riding only on a miniature 26 foot lifeboat and constantly being battered around by 70 foot waves! Will they survive or be crushed by the mighty relentless ocean.

Down to a Sunless Sea is short story written by Neil Gaiman and published in the British newspaper The Guardian on March 22nd 2013. Taking place in London, this story describes a rainy encounter on the banks of the Thames which unlocks a tale of loss and grief.

Through this insightful book, we see Mark Drolsbaugh?s struggles to survive underwater, and we eventually emerge from the sea and breathe fresh air with him as he finds the wisdom, courage, and skills necessary to treasure both land and sea.

In the novel Breathing Underwater, by renowned author Alex Flinn, the protagonist discloses a very personal story through the use of journals. Breathing Underwaters’ main character is sixteen-year-old Nick Andras. The novel begins in court room, where nick is being tried for abusing his former girlfriend. Nick is ordered to attend an anger management class and write 500 words a week about his past relationship. However in the flick Finding Forrester, the protagonist is teenage basketball star, Jamal. The movie begins in jamal's bedroom with shots of classic hardcover books, and small pocket journals. The viewers later find out that all the journal previously seen were jamal's, that he has been writing in since his father left. Finding forrester takes us through jamal's’ journey of befriending a recluded author and their connection through writing. Breathing underwater and finding forrester can be compared and contrasted in many ways.

Emergencies always seem to bring out the most amazing qualities in people. In the article, “The Man in the Water”, the author, Roger Rosenblatt, writes about the crash of Air Florida Flight 90 and the unknown man who saved many lives that day. Rosenblatt uses comparisons, quotations, and tone to show a contrast between the plane crash and the man in the water, belittling the crash and elevating the man to a heroic status.

Mars has been an interesting planet to mankind for years now, and scientists have decided to take things into their own hands. They are making plans to put people on Mars to have them live there. Consequently, they would need to face many problems during the period of time preparing for the journey to mars. One of the many problems they would have to face, for example, is: How will they get food, water, or air? Well, you’re about to find out. In Jennifer L Holm’s fictional story, “Follow the Water”, she uses facts about Mars to help you imagine some of the problems characters would have to face, and how they would be able to fix them in reality.

A book that had an impact on my life was The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey. This book is about an average teenage girl named Cassie Sullivan from Ohio whose world is destroyed by alien invaders. They unleashed 4 waves of attacks from their ship floating in the Earth's skies. The waves included all power shutdown, tidal waves that devastated the coasts and a plague. The last wave is they sent assassins to earth to get rid of the last humans.

The story The Killing Sea by Richard Lewis, in this book it shows that children don’t need their parents to survive. In the book, the main historical event was the Tsunami and it was set in 2004 and in a poor town in Indonesia. The major protagonists are Ruslan, Sarah, and Peter they are stuck in a place that is destroyed by a tsunami and they have to find out if their families are alive. Also, they have to join together and work with each other. Not only, soon they realize that one of them is sick and need to find him an infirmary to get medical attention.

Everyday Santiago in The Old Man and the Sea risks his life by returning to the ocean which “can be so cruel” and do “wild or wicked things” (Hemingway 29; Hemingway 30). When faced with a “very big Mako shark” (Hemingway 100), Santiago has “little hope” in defeating it, yet still thinks “maybe I can get him [the shark]” (Hemingway 101). Despite dehydration and exhaustion, Santiago defends his marlin by ramming “the harpoon down onto the shark’s head,” effectively killing it (Hemingway 102). By overcoming doubt and using all of his power, Santiago displays fearlessness in times of trouble. In All is Lost, Our Man shows courage by hopping off his boat in the midst of a treacherous storm and onto a life raft.

To begin, imagine yourself waking up on a boat in the middle of the sea with no food or water with a 450 pound bengal tiger alone, or how about living in an igloo in the rim of the polar sea with polar bears, extreme cold, and no food or clean water(again). The protagonists in both of the stories have to face some serious tasks in order to survive.

Researches have found different routes that all the trash could take. According to the research by Erik van Sebilla, the trash doesn't seem to just stay in one garbage patch. Currently there are 5 major garbage patches in our ocean. Their are two in the Pacific, two in the Atlanic and there is just one the in the Indian Ocean. Sebilla stated that the the trash from the Indian Oceean to Southern Australia could end uop in the PAcific Ocean. Also the trash from Eastern South Africa most likely will end up in the Atlanic Ocean. The video demonstrates what the garbage patches are made up of. In this video it shows how most of the trash in the ocean is plastic, which never breaks down. Many wonder how and where all the trash came from. In an artical

Ishmael meets Queequeg and they get hired together and board the whaling ship Pequod, whose captain searches for the whale that bit his leg off. Ahab offers a gold doubloon as a reward to motivate his crew to search for the whale with as much passion as he does. During the hunt, they try to kill any other whales they see, Ishmael gives a run down on whaling, the crew come across bad omens, and they meet ships devastated by Moby Dick in their search for the whale. After a three day chase of the whale, Moby Dick destroys the Pequod and kills every crew member, except for Ishmael, who survives by clinging to Queequeeq’s coffin, and is then rescued by a ship that lost some of its crew to Moby Dick.

On the morning of 16 April 2014, a horrible disaster known as ‘Sinking of MV Sewol’ occurred in South Korea. The most astounding part was that the ferry capsized while carrying 476 people, mostly secondary school students from Danwon High School. They were going on a happy school trip to the Jeju - island. Instead, they sink in deep Cold Ocean forever. It was shocking news for everyone, including myself. At first, it was not serious accident. If the coast guards come faster, then most of them could survive. However, the coast guards couldn’t go out easily because the weather got worse. When I read the book ‘The finest hours’, I recalled the calamity. What made the situation different? How the four coast guards could make such a brave selfless decision? I analyzed Andy Fitzgerald-one of the crew member of rescuing Pendleton-what traits

Wide Sargasso Sea is a novel written by Jean Rhys, discussing the life of Antoinette Cosway. Antoinette and her family are Creole and they live on a sugar plantation in Jamaica. Due to Antoinette’s Creole background, she and her family face a lot of problems and discrimination during their lives. However, when Antoinette grew older she had one friend named Tia. They played and talked together despite their obvious differences. On the night that Coulibri is set on fire, Antoinette flees with her family when she sees Tia. In search of comfort, Antoinette immediately goes to Tia, but instead of compassion Tia strikes a large stone at Antoinette’s face causing her to become injured. This event is significant, because it marks the first time that Antoinette experiences betrayal and hurt from someone whom she is fond of. This leads her to become reserved and begin to lose hope in others throughout the novel. Antoinette does not describe the physical pain of the attack, but rather the internal pain that she faced. This instance of betrayal from Tia exemplifies Antoinette’s isolation and loneliness in the community which ultimately causes her to lose her identity.

In the article, “Islands of Extinction,” William talks about her experience in her travels through different regions of the world. She has spent most of her 30-year career in the study of habitat fragmentation and the impact it has on nature. One area she specifically mentions is an island in Thailand called, The Chiew Islands. The small island couldn’t really contain large animals in the area so, they would quickly die out unlike the smaller animals. William later talk about her, PhD colleague, Tony Lynam, who has done several experiments with catching and ear tagging mammals. This experiment was a big impact to the article because two decades later another PhD student named, Luke Gibson, tried the same experiment at the same location. The