Tang.ɢwan-ḥačxʷiqak-Tsig̱is covers 2.3 per cent of all Canadian oceans, bringing the total percentage of protected waters to 15.54 per cent, a leap that supports Canada’s 30-by-30 target to protect 30 per cent of Canadian land and ocean by 2030.

“We’re six years away, and we just got to over half. That makes me feel like, yeah, we can do it,” says Dr. Cherisse Du Preez, the head of the Fisheries and Oceans deep sea ecology program. “We may miss the intermediate steps… but I think everyone feels like we would rather do this right than do it specifically on time. Nobody wants to just draw a big circle in the ocean and be like, well, this will get us there. No — we want to find those amazing areas,”

To Du Preez, protecting Tang.ɢwan-ḥačxʷiqak-Tsig̱is was a no-brainer. “It’s a terrible terminology, but this area, bang for your buck, is incredible because of the overlap,” she explains. “You have seamounts, and then you have the vents.” 

Hydrothermal vents and seamounts in close contact draw in specialized species for each level of the up to 3,500-metre tall submarine-mountains. “[Near the bottom] you could have those endemic hydrothermal vent animals and deep sea abyss animals,” starts Du Preez. “And when you are climbing up the cliffs of this volcano, you have coral and sponge reefs, and you have all the animals — rays and octopus that interact with that. You get to the summit, and it has schools of rockfish and sharks, and then you do it over again; you go down the other side of the slope.”

The Haida Nation takes pride in their initiative when it comes to marine protection. Areas such as SG̲áan K̲ínghlas-Bowie Seamount on Haida territory are protected and monitored solely by members of the nation, even before the area was recognized as an MPA by the Canadian government in 2008. 

Haida Nation President Gaagwiis Jason Alsop explains that Tang.ɢwan-ḥačxʷiqak-Tsig̱is was a case where the federal  government approached the nation to assist in the MPA. “[The Haida Nation] observed the process and eventually decided that we wanted to be involved directly. And, of course, they can’t just designate an area in our territory,” says Alsop. “We weren’t going to just sit back and let them try to create some MPA in our territory without our involvement, without our consent. And so, as we observed the process unfolding, we got involved and worked with the other nations to come together with an MOU.”

Governance around Tang.ɢwan-ḥačxʷiqak-Tsig̱is is still in the beginnings, says Alsop, but he notes the promise the MPA brings. “I think there’s just a lot of work to actually get a management plan and the board in place and really start governing and managing it,” says Alsop. “The designations and regulations are just the first step. And the next step is sitting at the table together.”

Nuu-Chah-Nulth Tribal Council president Judith Sayers recollects the negotiation process after meeting with the DFO. “[The involved nations] got strength and courage, knowledge and service. So we decided, ‘okay, let’s do this,’” says Sayers. “So, we met with DFO again. We struck up a technical team, and they started negotiating. I mean, seriously, there were at least 38 drafts of that agreement.”

The negotiation lasted four years before the Memorandum of Understanding was agreed upon. On the list of negotiations were co-management, naming privileges, and that the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (UNDRIP) had to be respected in decision-making. 

Sayers said the negotiation did not result in the nations receiving “everything they wanted.” Still, the promise of what was to come motivated the nations to commit to the project. “We know we can hold Canada’s feet to the fire,” says Sayers, who made clear the determination of the Nuu-Chah-Nulth and the general distrust of government promises. 

Du Preez certainly appreciates that commitment. “I love that we co-manage with coastal First Nations for a million different reasons, including all the knowledge they bring. They are also steadfast in this goal,” she says. “And I love that no matter what changes in our world, because things change a lot, they’ll hold us true to that commitment.”

The NorthEast Pacific Deep-Sea Exploration Project (NEPDEP) is a collaborative effort to discover, monitor and showcase the submarine spectacles of the northeast Pacific. It was through expeditions on research vessels with a collective of the brightest minds in marine technology, Indigenous knowledge, marine planning and communicators that brought forward the case for Tang.ɢwan-ḥačxʷiqak-Tsig̱is.  Using live streaming devices, the NEPDEP team show their findings online for free to millions of viewers. 

“It’s not for the sake of like, oh, look at us, look at the scientists,” notes Du Preez. “It’s all hyper-focused on the animals trying to bridge the gap between the public and the deep sea so that we can start making better decisions for our planet.”

Ocean Networks Canada’s North East Pacific Time-series Undersea Networked Experiments (NEPTUNE) uses fibre optic cable, hundreds of kilometres in length, to power thousands of sensors that measure and live stream “everything that is possible in the ocean,” says Ocean Networks Canada’s CEO Kate Moran. The list includes ocean currents, chemistry, sound, video, whale migration, a neutrino observatory, and much more.

The significant findings in the NEPTUNE project, says Morgan, are the baseline understanding of these deep-sea ecosystems. By creating the baseline data, the changes in the ecosystem are easier to monitor and assess the human influence, creating tangible evidence of change. 

Although the reach of the fibre optic sensors seems extensive, only roughly 20 per cent of the gigantic MPA has been mapped by the collective of organizations. Morgan figures further resources will be put into mapping and discovering new areas for protection, rather than mapping Tang.ɢwan-ḥačxʷiqak-Tsig̱is further, “but I would hope that more resources be put in place so we can map our planet. We have a map of the moon and Mars, it’s kind of ridiculous,” she points out.