Media Alert: Thursday (8/31) at The New York State Fair - 11:30 am-Noon at new State Fair Pond

• First-Ever Boat Launch into NY State Fair Pond (West End of Syracuse's Fairgrounds); On-Water Life Jacket and Water Safety Program
• New York Sea Grant and US Coast Guard Auxiliary personnel on standup paddleboard and in kayak in the pond

Contacts:

Dave White, New York Sea Grant Recreation and Tourism Specialist, E: dgw9@cornell.edu, P: 315.312.3042

Kara Lynn Dunn, Publicist, E: karalynn@gisco.net, P: 315.465.7578

Syracuse, NY, August 30, 2017 - Tomorrow (Thursday, August 31st) marks the first-ever boat to launch into the new pond at the west end of the Great New York State Fair will be a wooden kayak built by hand at the NY Experience: Maritime History showcase at the 2017 Great New York State Fair.
 
The kayak is one of 3 styles of wooden boat being built by H. Lee White Maritime Museum volunteer Rich Bush at the Fair. The others are a child-size kayak and a dory. The adult kayak was started on Opening Day, Wednesday, August 23.
 
The boat building demonstrations continue daily at 11 am, 1 pm, and 3 pm. As other boats are completed, they will be launched into the pond at the Fair as well.
 
Immediately after the boat launch on Thursday, New York Sea Grant and US Coast Guard Auxiliary personnel will present an on-water education demonstration aboard a stand-up paddleboard and in a kayak on how to identify and use approved life jackets.

More Info: 2017 State Fair NY Maritime Exhibit

The boat building demonstrations are part of "The Path through Our Maritime History: Waterways of War" exhibit coordinated by New York Sea Grant with the New York State Fair and several partners*
 
The exhibit includes:

• 15-foot replica of the USS Philadelphia, the Revolutionary War gunboat that carried General Benedict Arnold and his Continental Army troops in 1776
  
  
• Shipwreck Shack with a display on the proposed Great Lake Ontario National Marine Sanctuary project
  
  
• Boating and Buoys Shack with information on current era boating
  
  
• 2017 New York Sea Grant Clean and Safe Boating educational vessel, an 18-foot made-in-NY pontoon with an electric motor
  
  
• Great Lakes Research Consortium 24-7 sensing buoy transmitting air and water temperature and wind data into one of the exhibit tents; and
  
  
• Great Lakes Research Consortium in-water remotely operated vehicle demonstrations in the retention pond daily at 12 pm, 2 pm, and 4 pm.

* Exhibit sponsors include the New York State Fair, Great Lakes Seaway Trail, Great Lakes Research Consortium, H. Lee White Maritime Museum, US Coast Guard Auxiliary, Lake Champlain Maritime Museum, and the I Love NY Path Through History.

More Info: New York Sea Grant

New York Sea Grant (NYSG), a cooperative program of Cornell University and the State University of New York, is one of 33 university-based programs under the National Sea Grant College Program (NSGCP) of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The NSGCP engages this network of the nation’s top universities in conducting scientific research, education, training and extension projects designed to foster science-based decisions about the use and conservation of our aquatic resources. Through its statewide network of integrated services, NYSG has been promoting coastal vitality, environmental sustainability, and citizen awareness about the State’s marine and Great Lakes resources since 1971.

New York Sea Grant maintains Great Lakes offices at SUNY Buffalo, the Wayne County Cooperative Extension office in Newark and at SUNY Oswego. In the State's marine waters, NYSG has offices at Stony Brook University and Stony Brook Manhattan, in the Hudson Valley through Cooperative Extension in Kingston and at Brooklyn College. 

For updates on Sea Grant activities: www.nyseagrant.org has RSS, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube links. NYSG produces a monthly e-newsletter, "NOAA Sea Grant's Social Media Review," via its blog, www.nyseagrant.org/blog. Our program also offers a free e-list sign up via www.nyseagrant.org/coastlines for its flagship publication, NY Coastlines/Currents, which is published 1-2 times a year.