Asha de Vos Marine biologist and ocean educator

Years of advocating for Sri Lanka’s blue whales is paying off, Asha de Vos says. The nation’s government is taking steps to protect whales from the threats posed by shipping vessels. 

Asha de Vos likes to say her career started with a pile of faces. In 2003 the marine biologist was working on a researsh boat off the Sri Lankan coast when she saw excrement float to the surface. Six blue whales were swimming below in a narrow area within a busy shipping lane. Upon further investigation, de Vos realized that the whales were staying put instead of migrating to waters with richer food sources. Theorizing that they were an unrecognized unique population, she dubbed them the “unorthodox whales.” She also discovered that vessels moving to and from the port were often striking the creatures, sometimes fatally. In 2008 she set up the Sri Lankan Blue Whale Project to advocate for the protection of the whales and their North Indian Ocean habitat.

“My friends say I’m as unorthodox as the animals I study,” says de Vos, who is the first Sri Lankan to get a Ph.D. in marine mammal research. Despite being both highly educated and dedicated, she struggled for years to break into the conservation field in Sri Lanka. “People didn’t take me seriously because I was too young and too female, which for me is a compliment,” de Vos says. “Even now people say, ‘When are you getting married?’ Well, first I have a whole ocean to save.”

In 2011 a video highlighting de Vos’s work went viral, and her country started taking action. Recently, she was asked to be an adviser to the Ministry of Sustainable Development and Wildlife, which she sees as a chance to solidify conservation efforts. Sri Lanka, she says, “can be an example for marine sustainability in the developing world.”