Vancouver Islander on a mission to map the gaps in ocean floor discovery

To date, 75 per cent of the ocean floor remains undiscovered, and a Cordova Bay resident is on a mission to help international organizations change that.

Since 2016, Tim Kearns has organized the international conference Ocean Floor Explore. This year, the two-day conference will be held at the Victoria Conference Centre, Oct. 26 to 29, bringing together over 100 leaders in blue investing, philanthropy, technology and exploration.

Kearns' goal is to bring awareness to the scope of untapped data, generate enthusiasm, and pioneer a new funding model for ocean discovery driven by philanthropic, corporate and private citizens investing.

"[It] could be potentially a multi-decadal effort, but it could be done in our lifetime if we had the right funding, the right technology and really the righ