French scientist Antoine Collin has spent 25 hours travelling from Paris to Tahiti in the first leg of the Sen2Coral mission.

The field campaign aims to test and validate the capabilities of the Sentinel-2 satellite to monitor coral bleaching – a result of the current El Niño weather event underway.

He sent us this video message from Moorea, Tahiti’s sister island:

Tomorrow, Antoine will head to Nuku Hiva – the largest of the Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia. The final destination is Fatu Huku where he will spend two weeks taking underwater photographs, monitoring the benthic life and analysing coral bleaching.

Check back for updates on his mission!