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with minors in physics and mathematics. “So I sort of became lard. “Discovering hydrothermal vents and life system com- a Swiss army knife, master of nothing but pretty good at a lot pletely opened up prospecting for life throughout the universe of things. Today you don’t get a job and retire and get a gold and even within our own solar system.” watch. You go through multiple evolutions. And I’ve been able Another favorite was the discovery of perfectly preserved to recast myself multiple times because I’ve had that really ancient shipwrecks in the anoxic bottom waters of the Black strong, broad based experience in math, physics, chemistry, Sea. “That was another home run,” said Ballard.

and geology. So I’d say get a really broad base in the sciences.” While Ballard has spent much time at sea, on and below the waters, he sees the future generation ‘exploring’ the oceans from

Beyond “That Rusty Old Boat” the comforts of their own of? ces, labs and homes. Speci? cally,

The list of discoveries under Ballard’s guise is long and dis- he sees the evolution of telepresence technology and autono- tinguished, and while the discovery of Titanic was his most mous systems as working collaboratively to help future scien- acclaimed among the general population, it’s not his favorite. tists and explorers learn even more about what lies in the ocean. “Everyone wants me to say Titanic. I like to say, ‘Kids, my fa- “Now with the use of AUVs and autonomous surface vehi- vorite discovery is the one I’m about to make,’ because rumors cles, we have a whole cadre of tools we’re using; we call them of my death are greatly exaggerated.’” force multipliers … it’s going to be autonomous everything,”

In fact, he has two favorite discoveries, but he calls the discovery said Ballard. “I don’t expect humans to go to sea much (in of hydrothermal vents – Black Smokers – as the show-stopper. the future). I mean, I love horseback riding, but I don’t ride a “That rewrote the biology book, that was clearly one of the horse to work. We’re going to be very much in the world of most signi? cant discoveries ever made in the ocean,” said Bal- more and more intelligent autonomous vehicles.”

Emory Kristof/National Geographic

Memories of leisure and luxury strew the

Titanic site, such as the wroughtiron sides of deck benches, their wooden seats long rotted away.

Returning to

Titanic a year later, 1986, with

Alvin and JJ, along with much better cameras, we photographed every inch of the wreck, including the bow.

Robert Ballard and Martin Bowen/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) www.marinetechnologynews.com 39

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