For Better or Worse, Modern Ocean Explorers Stay Connected This
Behind the Scenes article was provided to LiveScience in
partnership with the National Science Foundation. On a six-week
business trip last winter, Cassandra Lopez posted updates to her
friends on Facebook, and conversed with her family on Gmail
chat. What made these interactions unique was that Cassandra was
on-location in the Southern Ocean, writing oceanography articles
from one of the world’s most remote places. 24/7 internet access
on research vessels attracts a new type of oceanographer – those
who want to get away from it all, but also blog about it.
Cassandra was aboard the R/V Roger Revelle, a vessel of the
Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) at UC San Diego in La
Jolla, Calif. Like most large ships of its generation, it comes
with advanced communication systems, as well as crew members
devoted to technical support. The satellite system on the R/V
Roger Revelle enables it to better serve as a laboratory for
scientific research by p