Dr Robert Ballard



Dr Robert Ballard
Source: JASON Project

"Captain Nemo from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne is who I always wanted to be. No doubt about it. I always had this dream of being inside his ship, the Nautilus. I think of myself as an explorer.”

Robert Ballard was born in Kansas in the United States but grew up in San Diego California. He is an American undersea explorer, marine scientist and geologist who has been on over 65 underwater expeditions in submarines and deep diving submersibles. He invented submersible photography tools that let him see things in very deep waters where a human being cannot safely dive. This new technology was very important to his successful undersea explorations.

In 1985, he and his crew found the shipwreck of the ocean liner "Titanic" in the very deep and cold North Atlantic. Later he and his crew found the shipwreck of the World War II German battleship "Bismark" as well as the World War I ocean liner "Lusitania" that had been sunk by a German torpedo. He has also explored many other shipwrecks. He has revolutionised undersea exploring by using remotely controlled submersible robotic devices. These ROV devices include Argo-Jason; Argo is a remotely controlled submersible vehicle with cameras, and Jason is carried in Argo and sent from it to collect samples and perform other functions. In 1989 Ballard founded the JASON Project to promote education programs that aim to inspire a life long passion for learning in science, math and technology.

Ballard's most recent discoveries include the Mediterranean Sea finds of sunken remains of ships along ancient trade routes (1997), two ancient Phoenician ships off Israel, the oldest shipwrecks ever found in deep water (1999), and four 1,500-year-old wooden ships—one almost perfectly preserved—in the Black Sea (2000) and in the Solomon Islands what is believed to be the remains of the World War II patrol boat the "PT-109" which was captained by John F. Kennedy, who would later become President of the United States (2002).

Nearly 20 years after first finding the sunken remains of the Titanic, Dr Robert Ballard returned in June 2004 to help the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)  study the ship to better understand how and why it is deteriorating so fast.

Check that you understand what these words mean in this document
An explorer: someone who travels to places where no one has ever been in order to find out what is there.
A marine scientist: a scientist who studies things related to the sea.
A geologist: a scientist who studies rocks or things related to the surface of the earth.
Submersible: a vessel that can dive deep into the sea.
To revolutionise: to change something for the better.
Device: an object that is used for a particular purpose.
To found: to bring something into existence.
To promote: to encourage.
To inspire: to make someone to want to do something.
Sunken (to sink): having fallen to the bottom.
To deteriorate: to become worse.