Originally built for fishery protection, scientists later used the ship for ocean research. Named Falkor, the 82.9-meter ship was originally built in 1981 as a fishery protection vessel. According to Schmidt Ocean Institute, Eric and Wendy Schmidt acquired it in 2009, when they founded the institute, and subsequently commissioned a two-year refit to convert it into a research vessel.
At the time Schmidt Ocean Institute announced its gift to Italy’s National Research Council in March 2022, Falkor had completed 81 expeditions, hosted 1,056 foreign scientists, and mapped 1.3 million square kilometers of seafloor. The vessel was to be renamed Gaia Blu and would conduct further ocean research under the Italian agency called CNR.
However, the vessel’s rebirth started back in 2009 when the Schmidts purchased it and founded Schmidt Ocean Institute. In two years of refurbishment, the former fisheries protection ship became “the first-ever year-round philanthropic research vessel,” according to the institute’s description. The main feature of the vessel was that it could provide its services to researchers for free.
This approach was responsible for shaping the function of the Falkor for the next decade to come. This included hosting international scientists on research expeditions and ensuring that the ocean science conducted aboard the ship was accessible to groups capable of utilizing the resources available. By March 2022, the ship had traveled a distance equivalent to 12 circumnavigations of Earth, the institute said.
The achievements made by the Falkor at sea
The Schmidt Ocean Institute’s annual impact report 2022 identifies 81 expeditions and 1,845 days of science carried out by the Falkor, traveling 521,000 kilometers at sea. The number of square kilometers of seafloor mapped is listed at 1.34 million.
The ship was also involved in subsea research. The remotely operated vehicle SuBastian conducted 481 subsea dives throughout the expedition, with the dives totaling 2,415 hours of diving into the depths of the sea. Researchers collected 6,194 samples. The annual report also recorded 26 new species discoveries and 633 terabytes of scientific data collected
In March 2022, the institute announced several discoveries related to the explorations made using the ship. Among them, there were 500-meter-high coral reefs at the Great Barrier Reef and deep-sea coral gardens in southwestern Australia, as well as rare footage of the elusive glass octopus.
Falkor’s role was not limited to gathering samples and mapping the seafloor. Its annual report states that 1,056 scientists, 340 students, and 43 artists were involved in its expeditions. The institute produced 202 scientific papers and more than 5,135 articles on studies. Public engagement activities consisted of 684 talks and podcasts, and Ship-to-Shore initiatives.
A new home for the ship
The transfer to CNR was the last step of the collaboration between Schmidt Ocean Institute and Falkor, but not the end of the research career of the ship. The institute said that the Italian National Research Council would employ the ship in ocean science investigations in the Mediterranean Sea and elsewhere. The CNR was Italy’s largest research organization, with 88 institutes nationwide and a 450-strong marine science community, as stated in the announcement.
The president of CNR, Maria Chiara Carrozza, added that the acquisition will help CNR collaborate with international institutes and universities researching the Mediterranean and beyond. The donation matched the history of the vessel with the marine science program of the CNR.
The Schmidt Ocean Institute had plans to continue its operations with a new ship called the Falkor (too). The ship was bigger than the previous one, at 110 meters, and was set to launch in early fall of 2022 following the installation of new technologies on the ship, according to the press release.
The transfer of Falkor came with a rebranding and a new research mission. As of 2022, its achievements included the mapping of more than 1.3 million square kilometers of seafloor, many deep-ocean dives, and expeditions conducted by scientists from different nations. The fisheries patrol ship had been transformed into a research vessel that would be owned by Italy’s National Research Council.