Subject: MidLink
From: Craig S Nelson
To: mccullen@aquarius.cc.ucf.edu
By way of introduction, I am Captain Craig S. Nelson, NOAA a commissioned officer in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration of the Department of Commerce. I am Commanding Officer of the NOAA Ship MALCOLM BALDRIGE, a 278 foot oceanographic research vessel that operates out of Miami, Florida. The ship left Miami on February 13, 1995 and is currently on the first leg of an around-the-world oceanographic research cruise that will take us around the Cape of Good Hope this month, into the Indian Ocean for 7 months of work, and then finally into the Pacific Ocean late in 1995. Our return transit through the Panama Canal will be in January 1996, so that we will complete our circumnavigation just about one year after we departed home port.
Although most of our work will be in the open ocean, we will be making port calls in several foreign ports to resupply and exchange scientists and crew. We also transit past remote locations in the world's oceans that are infrequently visited by other people. For example, yesterday, we stopped at Ascension Island, a British held island approximately 700 miles north of St. Helena, where Napoleon Bonaparte was exiled. The British colonized Ascension Island in part to ensure that no vessel trying to reach St. Helena to free Bonaparte would go undetected.
My ship's officers and I would be delighted to contribute to MidLink and/or correspond with students at Discovery Middle School about our projects and experiences throughout the year. I believe that we can provide unique and hopefully creative opportunites for learning, and the topics could cover the spectrum from science (oceanography, meteorology, physics) to math and on to the social sciences (different cultures), geography, and history.
To give you a brief idea of what we will be doing and where the ship is going, I have appended a copy of a press release that was prepared prior to our departure from Miami, and a copy of our sailing schedule for the year. I look forward to your response. You can send email to me via my Internet alias: baldrige@ocean.aoml.erl.gov
Sincerely,
Craig S. Nelson
Captain, NOAA
Commanding Officer
NOAA Ship MALCOLM BALDRIGE