Meet the Cruise Crew: Viking's Chief Scientist On Ship Life in Antarctica

18.11.2024 - 22:19 / cntraveler.com

This is the first installment of our new bimonthly column Crews on Cruise, spotlighting the people who work behind the scenes of the world’s most memorable voyages—from bartenders and entertainers to ship captains and expedition leaders.

When Brandi Revels joined Viking in 2021 as the cruise line’s first Chief Scientist, she hadn’t really considered what it would mean to live for months at a time on an expedition vessel—she was just enchanted by the research opportunities, educational outreach, and undeniable lure of traveling to some of the farthest reaches of earth. Dr. Revels received her Master of Science in Oceanography, Chemical and Physical from the University of South Carolina and her Doctor of Science in Geochemistry and Petrology/Analytical Chemistry from ETH Zurich. In her role with Viking, she navigates itineraries throughout Antarctica and the Great Lakes, and, in 2025, the Arctic, joining guests for shore excursions and landings, overseeing field research and leading experiments such as the NOAA weather balloon launch, and delivering lectures on everything from geology to paleoclimatology. We caught up with Dr. Revels in between expeditions to chat about the potential long-term impact of citizen science, why icebergs still blow her mind, and what it’s like to have 250 roommates.

Why did you decide to work on cruise ships?

In the world of science, you are often only speaking to the 20 or 30 people who do what you do; it's a bit of an echo chamber. But I've always thought that communication should be a big part of what we do as scientists. After all, it's often the public who's funding us and if we can't communicate what we're doing with the public, then we're not doing anyone a service. I knew that outreach was a big part of this job, plus I was really eager to work in remote places. A job where I could combine science, travel, and outreach? Sign me up.

My background is in nuclear chemistry and climatology. Guests may know a little piece of that puzzle, but what they've never been exposed to is how long-scale geological processes influence long-scale and short-scale oceanic processes, which influence biology, which influences climate. It’s all connected. When you’re in academia, you’re fighting over minutiae: Does this reaction happen in this way under these circumstances? Guests don’t care about that stuff. They want to know the big-picture scale. For me, it’s quite refreshing to take a step back and think about how these big processes affect each other. [The exchange] is bidirectional too. A lot of the challenges that I have are engineering-based or methodological: You’re in Antarctica and you need some piece of scientific equipment to work. How do I make it do the thing I want it