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Press
Release
 Who
is that in the picture?
Her name is Sylvia Earle, and the
weekend of March 28, 29, and 30, 2008
she will be celebrated at Beneath the
Sea 2008 as Legend of the Sea,
when Beneath the Sea convenes
its’ Ocean Adventure and Travel show at
the Meadowlands Exposition Center in
Secaucus, New Jersey.
Photo Credit: Tim Taylor courtesy of
DOER Marine
However, Sylvia Earle’s celebration
began many years ago when, in 1955, this
New Jersey girl took her B.S. degree in
hand and headed out into the world of
oceanography. Sylvia specialized in
botany, believing that understanding the
vegetation is the first step to
understanding the ecosystem. She had her
M.S. by 1956 and her Ph D in ’66. In
there somewhere she learned to scuba
dive and when combined with her lab
savvy she knew she could use this, then
new, technology to study marine life
first hand.
Following her Ph D Sylvia married,
had three children, traveled, while
four-months pregnant, to a hundred feet
below the waters of the Bahamas in the
submersible Deep Diver, and later left
for six weeks in the Indian Ocean with a
National Science Foundation expedition.
That’s how she spent the 60’s juggling
home, children and scientific
expeditions that took her around the
world.
Then Harvard wanted her as a Research
Fellow; then the Cape Haze Marine Lab
wanted her as Resident Director; by 1970
she led the first all-female research
expedition that would live for two weeks
fifty-feet under the water in Tektite
II. The publicity surrounding Tektite II
made Sylvia a recognizable face beyond
the scientific community, and she became
increasingly in demand as a public
speaker. At that time she also began to
write for National Geographic and to
produce books and films in an effort to
arouse public awareness of our aqua
sphere.
The 1970’s saw Sylvia traveling
around the world on countless scientific
missions: Galapagos, China, Bahamas, and
the Indian Ocean again, and a graveyard
of battleships in the Caroline Islands
in the South Pacific.
1977 she was off chasing great sperm
whales following these behemoths from
Hawaii to New Zealand, Australia, South
Africa, Bermuda and Alaska. The result
of those three years of work was “Gentle
Giants of the Pacific.”
1979, Sylvia Earle walks unteathered
on the sea floor at a depth lower than
any other human being has ever been
before … or since. In a Jim suit, a
one-atmosphere pressurized garment, she
was taken by submersible to 1,250 feet
below the ocean’s surface off the
Hawaiian island of Oahu. At the bottom,
Sylvia detaches herself from the vessel
and explored the depth for the next
two-and-a-half hours with only a
communication line connecting her to the
sub, and nothing connecting her to the
worlds above. Then she wrote about her
adventure in her 1980 book: “Exploring
the Deep Frontier.”
In the 1980’s Sylvia started two
companies: Deep Ocean Engineering and
Deep Ocean Technologies. These companies
design and build undersea vehicles like
the Deep Rover and Deep Flight making it
possible for scientists to reach and
work at depths too precarious for
previously existing technology.
In the 1990’s Sylvia Earle took a
leave of absence from her companies to
serve as Chief Scientist of the National
Oceanographic and Atmosphere
Administration.
Today finds Sylvia
explorer-in-residence at the National
Geographic Society. To date she has led
more than fifty worldwide expeditions
spending an excess of 6500 hours
underwater in connection with her
research. She has authored more than
one-hundred publications concerning
marine science and technology,
participated in numerous television
productions, and has lectured in over
sixty countries on scientific, technical
and general interest subjects related to
the oceans.
Sylvia Earle, in addition to being
Beneath the Sea’s and the Historical
Diving Society’s Legend of the Sea for
2008, is also: Honorary President of the
Explorer’s Club, a Wyland Icon Lifetime
Achievement Award winner, 1996
Explorer’s Club Medal winner, 1991 DEMA
Hall of Fame Award winner, she holds the
Explorers Club Lowell Thomas Award, and
is a member of The Women Diver’s Hall of
Fame, amongst a proud array of other
medals, and honorary degrees.
Beneath the Sea and the Historical
Diving Society is honored to have Dr.
Sylvia Earle as their 2008 Legend of the
Sea.
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