The Oregon Coast Aquarium entrance in Newport. Photo: OCAQMarketing, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Construction on the Oregon Coast Aquarium’s new marine wildlife center in South Beach is expected to wrap up in late December. Once it opens, stranded sea turtles that used to be patched up in Newport and driven to Southern California will be able to stay longer on the central coast.
The $12.5 million Sis-Xa Xwee-Nish Marine Wildlife Center is mostly on time and on budget, aquarium director of animal care Jim Burke told the Lincoln Chronicle. The name means “ocean life.” The aquarium chose it with the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians, using Athabaskan words from the heritage of the central coast’s Indigenous people, according to an earlier aquarium update.
Here is what changes.
Animals can stay. Until now, rescued animals were often stabilized and moved out quickly. Marine mammals usually went to Sausalito. Sea turtles went to San Diego. Burke said the aquarium will now be able to treat sea turtles in Newport and hold them closer to their release date before the final trip south. The aquarium told the Chronicle it expects to start rehabilitating sea turtles next year.
More species, more room. The aquarium is the only facility in Oregon, and one of three in the Pacific Northwest, authorized to give critical care to endangered marine animals such as sea turtles, Guadalupe fur seals and western snowy plovers. The campus will have three buildings and outdoor areas totaling just over 21,000 square feet. Most of the more than 10,000 square feet indoors is for animal care. Outside, a similarly sized holding area will have deep pools for birds like pelicans and shallow ones for shorebirds like sandpipers, with netting overhead. There is a dedicated sea turtle room and space to hold sea otters. Two smaller buildings handle water treatment and necropsies.
Diagnostics at home. Blood work and X-rays on larger animals, including the aquarium’s own residents, will be done on site. Staff sometimes have to drive animals to Corvallis for that work now.
Training. The center has space for training future veterinarians, rehabilitation specialists and rescue responders, and the aquarium plans to host training conferences there.
The building is not open to the public, though Burke said the aquarium plans to tell its story inside the main aquarium. President and CEO Carrie Lewis said the aquarium works alongside the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, Hatfield Marine Science Center and the Marine Mammal Institute.
The project has been local from the start. Capri Architecture of Newport designed it and Quality Construction is the general contractor. Burke credited early purchases of specialty plumbing parts, made before tariffs took effect, with helping hold costs down. The Sisters-based Roundhouse Foundation gave the first $4 million, Lewis said, and grants, private foundations, individual donors and some aquarium reserves covered the rest.
Crews broke ground in late 2024. The center joins a South Beach campus that already anchors much of the area’s visitor economy, something we looked at in our piece on the aquarium’s role there.
Marnie Holcomb is the editor and publisher of Oregon Coast Daily News and covers Lincoln County government and community life.
