My Remarks at Ocean Sciences Meeting 2026
I'm speaking at a COMPASS townhall on Communicating Risk Effectively at Ocean Sciences meeting 2026 on Monday, February 23. If you're there, please join us! Strategic Science Communication in Practice: My Remarks at the Communicating Risk Effectively Townhall Good afternoon. My name is Angelo Villagomez, and today I want to discuss how risk communication functions in practice, using the recent 60‑day campaign to oppose deep‑sea mining near the Mariana Trench as a case study. On November 11, virtually no one in the Mariana Islands had heard of deep‑sea mining. Then on November 12, the Trump administration announced a 30‑day plan to begin the process that could open areas near the Mariana Trench to industrial extraction. The timeline was abrupt, the issue was unfamiliar, and our community was completely unprepared for it. With no resources, no prepared messaging, and no existing coalitions, we had to build a comprehensive campaign from scratch—and we had to do it quickly. ...