Introducing Riley Elliott, the man from Atlantis.

We’re pleased to introduce Riley Elliott, an ocean lover who shares our passion for diving and will be working with Atlantis as a brand ambassador.
 
Riley is a 26 year old Marine Biologist with a MSc and Honors from Otago University. He’s been constantly inspired by oceanic life, pursuing scuba and freedive expeditions around the globe. “I love the physical and technical challenges of freediving – spearing fish and hunting crays” says Riley, who is also an accomplished surfer.

Recently, Riley has begun specializing in shark research, awareness and conservation and has travelled to South Africa several times researching great whites, bull sharks and tiger sharks, working to understand human-shark interactions and make people aware of the problems they face now and in the future.
 
Riley explains: “Overfishing, by-catch and the shark fin industry combine to kill 70-90 million sharks a year. Sharks need our help not only to protect them – but also our fisheries and ocean ecosystem as a whole. Sharks, as apex predators, keep a balance in the ocean created over millions of years of evolution.”
 
For these reasons Riley is beginning his PhD through Auckland University to investigate sharks around New Zealand’s coast. Kitted out in Atlantis dive gear, he will be exploring New Zealand’s waters, identifying shark hotspots, free-diving with sharks to enable photo identification and tagging them to track behaviours.
 
Atlantis is proud and excited to partner with Riley and support his important research. We’ll keep you updated with his adventures along the way. Diving is our passion too.

Images courtesy of: www.fionaayerst.com