Seafaring in the 21St Century: The Malaspina 2010 Circumnavigation Expedition

Half a millennium ago Spain completed, under the leadership of the Portuguese ­mariner­ Fernao­ de­Magalhaes,­ the­ first­ circumnavigation of the ocean. A quarter of a century later, Alessandro Malaspina, a navy officer­and­scientist,­led­the­first­Spanish­circumnavigation­ with­ scientific­ goals.­ These­ were­to­provide­an­account­of­the­flora,­fauna,­ and natural resources of the Spanish kingdom, which at the time extended from Italy to the Philippines. In December 2010 a new expedition, the Malaspina Circumnavigation Expedition, on the 200 anniversary of Alessandro Malaspina’s death, departed from the same harbor of Cadiz to circumnavigate the planet on a quest to advance our understanding of the ocean. Five­hundred­years­following­the­first­circumnavigation, the question may be raised if old-fashioned seafaring has still much to add to our understanding of the ocean (Laursen 2011). One might think that recent advances in remote sensing and autonomous vehicles have done away with the need to sail the oceans once more. However, I argue that seafaring is still essential to further our understanding of the oceans and that neither one of the key goals of the Malaspina Circumnavigation Expedition would have been met through the use of remote sensing or autonomous vehicles. The­ goals­ of­ the­Malaspina­Circumnavigation Expedition were to provide an assessment of the state of the oceans in 2011 and to explore, using advanced next-generation sequencing tools, the diversity of life in the ocean, with a particular emphasis in the dark ocean (cf. www.expedicionmalaspina.es). In addition, the project aimed at shifting the interactions among Spanish marine research groups from an excessive focus on competition to a balance between competition and cooperation through the demonstration of the­ benefits­ of­ a­ cooperative­ approach­ and,­ in doing so, build critical mass and leadership capacity. Furthermore, it aimed at prompting the interest for marine science by the Spanish­ public­ and­ to­ foster­ scientific­ vocations­ among its youth. The­project­involved­35­Spanish­research­ groups and a total of 28 international partners from a total of 18 nations across the world, with an estimated total of about 400 scientists and a total of 700 persons involved in various capacities, including logistics, outreach, technical, and administrative support.