By Maia Hoeberechts, Associate Director, User Services

It’s always a pleasure to visit Port Alberni, an important partner for Ocean Networks Canada (ONC) and the home of the NEPTUNE observatory shore station. Recently, I travelled with our Indigenous outreach team—Jessica Brown and Mercedes Mclean—to this Vancouver Island community and Nuu-chah-nulth Territory, to introduce the latest proposed community observatory site in ONC’s Smart Ocean™ Systems project.

Building on the successful technology and data delivery of the NEPTUNE and VENUS observatories, ONC has developed a smaller, coastal observing system suitable for near-shore installations. The observatory proposed for Alberni...