The future USNS Robert Ballard will honour Dr Robert Ballard, an ex-U.S. Navy Commander and the former director of the Center for Ocean Exploration. A professor with the Department of Oceanography at the University of Rhode Island’s Graduate School of Oceanography, he’s known widely as a discoverer of the final resting place of the R.M.S. Titanic.
The name selection follows the convention of naming survey vessels after names of explorers, famous marine surveyors, and oceanographers. Ballard was...