Ocean gives videographer new life

Fifteen years ago, on the last day of 2002, Ray Hollowell died after a 20-foot wave pounded him into the shallow reef at the notorious Banzai Pipeline on Oahu’s North Shore.

The ocean videographer and television producer was filming big-wave surfers when he was slammed headfirst into the jagged reef and knocked unconscious by several monstrous waves. Another cameraman found him floating facedown, and by the time he was able to get him onto shore, Hollowell had swallowed four liters of salt water and turned blue.

“I’m pretty much the worst drowning victim that lived to talk about it,” said Hollowell, 60, former co-founder of the OC16 show “Hawaiian Xtreme Sports TV.” “I literally died at Pipeline. I was dead for about three minutes.”

Miraculously, North Shore lifeguards were able to resuscitate him.

“I had a helmet on — that pretty much saved my life,” he said.

However, he sustained two brain contusions, a collarbone broken in four places, two broken ribs, a torn rotator cuff, a bruised lung and a critical lung infection known as chemical pneumonia. He was in the intensive care unit for nine days, three of which he spent unconscious. The History Channel aired a documentary on Hollowell’s harrowing ordeal.

Suffice it to say, that experience changed his life.

He resolved to do all he could to bring the healing power of the ocean to people in need. In 2009 he started Sea Inspiration (previously called PlanSEA.org), a nonprofit that promotes ocean-related programming on syndicated networks to teach the importance of caring for the ocean. The organization also arranges ocean adventures, including surfing, paddling, snorkeling, canoeing, swimming with marine animals, as well as skydiving and zip-lining for children with medical challenges and U.S. military service members and veterans.

“The ocean offers healing. The sea inspires us with its power and diversity. Seeing the sea inspire and heal motivates us,” he said on his website, seainspiration.org.

“That did help me change my focus. I always had a passion, but it helped instill in me the fact that I needed to give back and try to help the ocean,” said Hollowell, who has documented massive pods of dolphins, sharks and humpback whales circling around him on several occasions.

“That’s one of scariest things I’ve ever done,” he said. “But they trust me. I don’t talk to them, but it seems as though they know I’m there to do good and not bad.”

The Virginia native “absolutely loved” the ocean since he was about 5 years old, living surrounded by farmland.

“I used to dream the cornfields across the street was an ocean,” he said. “I would get sick to my stomach and anxiety because I wanted the cornfields to be an ocean.”

Fortunately, the ocean was 30 minutes away from his childhood home, and at 12 years old an uncle took him surfing for the first time. But he ended up enjoying free diving and filming ocean animals underwater more than the surf. Before his near-fatal accident at Pipeline, he was the only guy swimming in the minimum 40-foot swells as he filmed the Eddie Aikau big-wave surf contest for Quiksilver.

“When he’s in the ocean, animals come to him, like the dog whisperer,” said Patti Mitchell, Hollowell’s girlfriend and president of Sea Inspiration. “He was filming dolphins, and all of sudden everything went black and he realized a whale was right in front of him. We’ll be out in the ocean, and then here comes a dolphin boat, then Ray will just go swim off on his own and before you know it dolphins will come to him.”

Mitchell said her boyfriend was born with passion and empathy for people and animals.

“There are so many passionate people out there, and Ray is one of them. He’ll walk down the street and see a bird, and no one else would notice it. He will rescue a bird with a broken wing and give it a good life,” she said. “He’s just a compassionate, caring, giving soul.”

Next month Sea Inspiration will begin airing segments about the marine environment on a nationally syndicated TV show, “AquaKids,” on Sundays at 9:30 a.m. on Channel 5. The show is expected to reach more than 90 million homes.

“I want to know that when I leave the earth that I did the best I could to try to make a positive impact on the people around me and the marine environment,” Hollowell said. “I want kids to have hope that we just don’t leave them a mess and didn’t do anything to fix it.”