The Great Bear Rainforest[2][3] is a temperate rain forest on the Pacific coast of British Columbia, comprising 6.4 million hectares.

[3][5] The Great Bear Rainforest was officially recognized by the Government of British Columbia in February 2016, when it announced an agreement to permanently protect 85% of the old-growth forested area from industrial logging.

Much of the Pacific coastline of North America shares this climate pattern, including portions of Alaska, British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and Northern California.

Then Peter McAllister, an ex-chair of the Sierra Club of Western Canada,[16] veteran forest campaigner[17][18] and early advocate for boycotts against the timber industry[19][20][21][22][23] chartered a three-masted ship, skippered by an arctic adventurer, Sven Johansson.

Their mission was to begin exploring, researching and bringing recognition to the ecological and cultural values of a significant expanse of the earth’s temperate rainforest.

[26][27][28] The first order of business on every voyage was to offer support to the coastal First Nations in their struggle to take back their traditional territory from the timber industry.

[36] Mike Humphries, a Second World War fighter pilot, flew aerial reconnaissance, enhancing the documentation of remote logging operations while offering a bird's eye view.

[39][40][41] Stories of these first years of the campaign were presented in slide shows in western North America and Europe while those on board spread the word in newspapers, articles, journals and magazines.

Jup Weber, MP of Luxembourg, a leader of the Greens, and a critic of the province’s logging practices, invited Peter McAllister to the European Parliament in Strasbourg to present evidence of the over-cutting of the coastal temperate rainforest, countering decades of denials by the provincial government and the timber industry.

Subsequently Raincoast’s aerial reconnaissance photography was used to convince major home building suppliers to threaten logging companies harvesting in Heiltsuk territory with boycotts.

This forced the provincial government and the timber industry to come to the table for the beginning of a long process of negotiations involving the protection of the Great Bear Rainforest.

[66] On 7 February 2006 a comprehensive protection package was announced for the Great Bear Rainforest, which was defined to include the central and north coasts of BC and Haida Gwaii (formerly known as the Queen Charlotte Islands).

[65] The 2006 agreement between the BC government and a coalition of conservationists, loggers, hunters, and First Nations established a series of conservancies stretching 400 kilometres (250 mi) along the coast.

[74][75] The fuel spill was the last major incident to occur in the region since BC Ferries' Queen of the North ran aground and sank off the coast of Gill Island on 21 March 2006.