Meet The Team

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Charles ‘Stormy’ Mayo, PhD, Program Director
Stormy is a Senior Scientist and Chair of the Department of Ecology at the Center for Coastal Studies, and is one of the three founders of the Center for Coastal Studies.  His technical work ranges from complex computer modeling of foraging movements of whales to the development of new techniques for documenting whale behavior and zooplankton distribution.  Stormy is also known for his efforts to reduce whale mortality caused by entanglement in fishing gear through the development of new management techniques and methods to rescue entangled whales at sea.  He serves on several federally empanelled conservation teams including the Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Team.  Stormy holds a Ph.D. degree from the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences.

Christy Hudak, Research Associate
Christy has been a Research Associate in the Right Whale Ecology Program at the Center for Coastal Studies for over ten years. After obtaining her M.S. in marine biology from Nova Southeastern University in Florida, Christy worked at the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission, heading the Manatee Program at the Tequesta Field Station. From the sunny shores of Florida, Christy brought her experience in marine mammal necropsies, rescues, tracking, aerial surveys, and photo identification to the cool shores of Cape Cod and currently focuses on the food resource of the North Atlantic right whales, microplastics, and eDNA.

Amy James, Aerial Observer & Flight Coordinator
Amy became fascinated by North Atlantic right whales while working off Jeffreys Ledge in 2008 with the Whale Center of New England. Shortly after, she moved to Australia where she spent seven years researching humpbacks and sea turtles. She returned to Massachusetts as a right whale intern at Center for Coastal Studies during the 2011 season, before heading back Down Under to complete her Master’s degree at the University of Queensland followed by work as an aerial observer and fieldwork coordinator. When she moved back to the US in 2016, she rejoined the CCS family to continue with the aerial survey team.

Brigid McKenna, Aerial Observer & Data/Photo Manager
Brigid was born and raised in South Boston, MA, and has connections to the Cape dating back to the Mayflower. After graduating from Boston Latin School, she completed her undergraduate degree in biology at the University of Massachusetts–Amherst with honors. She began researching North Atlantic right whales at CCS as an intern in 2013, and since then has obtained her master’s degree from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. In between past field seasons in Cape Cod Bay, Brigid has been a member of the New England Aquarium’s right whale team conducting research in Bay of Fundy and Gulf of St Lawrence and has worked as a marine mammal observer for NOAA.

Ryan Schosberg, Aerial Observer
Growing up on Long Island, NY, Ryan had always been fascinated by the ocean and the coast. This interest eventually led to earning an undergraduate degree in marine science at Boston University. After working with southern right whales in South Africa, Ryan was inspired to intern with the Center for Coastal Studies north atlantic right whale team for the 2016 season. Since then, he has received a master’s degree in marine science and management from the University of Sydney and worked in recreational fisheries management back home in New York before eventually returning back to the field with right whales as an aerial observer in the southeast US. Ryan rejoined CCS as a member of the aerial survey team in 2021.

Will Carome, Aerial Observer
Originally landlocked in Washington, DC, Will fell in love with the ocean and whales on family vacations to Wellfleet and whale watches from Provincetown. After graduating with a degree in biology from Boston College, he studied marine mammal acoustics at WHOI before embarking on a master’s in marine science at The University of Otago in Aotearoa, New Zealand. There, he examined relationships between vessel traffic and endangered Hector’s dolphins. After returning to Massachusetts to work with LobsterLift, a startup developing ropeless fishing systems, Will joined CCS as an Aerial Observer in 2023.

Sasha Milsky, Intern
Meet Sasha Milsky, a 2023 right whale habitat ecology intern working with Christy Hudak. She graduated with a degree in biology from Union College in June 2022 where she studied the use of stable isotopes as a method to track the previous hosts of black-legged ticks. The past few months, she has been working at Mass Audubon in Wellfleet Bay on both the diamondback terrapin conservation project as well as the cold stunned sea turtle rescue project. She plans to pursue graduate studies in marine habitat ecology.

Molly Tucker, Intern
Molly (they/ them) grew up in southeast Texas along the Gulf of Mexico. Their undergraduate degree was a series of patched together experiences that allowed them to study orca acoustics in Alaska, barnacles and sea monsters in Connecticut, reef ecology in Belize, and blue and Bryde’s whales in Sri Lanka before settling at College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, ME. There, they studied environmental policy and marine mammals with a focus on Rice’s whales down in the Gulf of Mexico, and they worked for Allied Whale matching humpback flukes, doing community outreach, and as a deckhand/ research assistant on the Bar Harbor Whale Watch. They graduated with a degree in human ecology in 2022.

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Entanglement Hotline: (800) 900-3622
[email protected]
(508) 487-3622
5 Holway Avenue
Provincetown, MA 02657
(508) 487-3623

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