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magazine / ma99
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March/April 1999 issue |
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Titanic talk
Steve Blasco continues to unravel the secrets of the ill-fated ship
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| Photo by Corbis/Bettman |
When people ask, as they invariably do, what it was like to be
crammed into a miniature submersible for 17 hours, how he felt
descending 3,800 metres to explore the sunken Titanic and the
ocean floor beneath it — frightened? claustrophobic? overwhelmed?
— Steve Blasco is tempted to retort: "What do you mean,
what’s it like? I’m not sitting under a palm tree drinking a
pina colada."
Blasco is not complaining about the questions people have regarding
the 1991 Canadian-Russian-American Titanic expedition for which
he was chief scientist — the second scientific study of the wreck
site and the exploration featured in the IMAX film Titanica. On
the contrary, he craves them. After speaking publicly for the past
eight years about the expedition and its revelations, it is the
questions, he says, that keep the experience from growing stale.
Not the unenlightening staples like, "How did you go to the
bathroom?" but the surprises — like the man who stood up at
one lecture and demanded, "Who cares? Who cares about the ocean
floor?"
A marine engineering geophysicist with the Geological Survey of
Canada in Dartmouth, N.S., Blasco has studied four Great Lakes shipwrecks
and one in the Arctic since the filming of Titanica. He says he
might have quit lecturing about his adventure long ago, "but
I’m always challenged. Every time I learn something new."
His newest revelations surround James Cameron’s Oscar-winning film,
Titanic. Blasco was involved with its production. Under his guidance,
Cameron designed a miniature replica of the ship’s bow, his model
for plotting shots before going underwater. But until a lecture-goer
asked — and Blasco later investigated — he did not know there
was a real-life version of the film’s steamy romance. He now has
a tale to tell, discovered by Montréal reporter Alan Hustak,
about a Montrealer named Quiggley Baxter who perished at sea, but
not before engaging in a "torrid affair" on board with
a Belgian cabaret singer named Berthe Mayne.
Sounds a bit off-topic — indeed almost frivolous — for a scientist.
But Blasco is no snob. He fields technical questions from engineers
and advises elementary schoolteachers on how to use the Titanic
to kick-start a geography lesson on the oceans. He describes to
biologists the 28 species of animals that have colonized the Titanic,
defying theories that the deep sea is a dead zone. He willingly
takes a grilling from a small photography club, a 350-strong pack
of students — even Naina Yeltsin, the Russian president’s wife.
(Mrs. Yeltsin, a structural engineer, had Blasco summoned to Nova
Scotia during the G7 Summit in 1995 for a private lecture on his
team’s discovery that the Titanic was made of "brittle"
steel that fractured easily when the iceberg struck.)
Blasco’s Titanic adventure has not only taught him reams about
the deep ocean — lessons he is eager to share. It has made him
a bit of a historian, a bit of a gossip, a bit of a film buff, and
a bit reßective. Though he tries to dismiss those incessant
proddings — "What was it like?" — they have got him
thinking. "Once in a while you’d stop and look out a porthole,"
he says, "and for a second you’d think you were pushing fate
just by being there."
— Anita Lahey
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Explorers and scientists star in cable TV series
When the kids dropped the hissing cockroaches
and the critters began to scurry across the set, things got a
bit chaotic. But it was great TV in the making.
That’s the hope, anyway, as Rogers Community
Television prepares to air the first episode of "It’s In
Our Nature," a joint production with the Canadian Museum
of Nature (CMN) and The Royal Canadian Geographical Society (RCGS).
The series is scheduled to be shown in Ottawa on Mondays at 9
p.m., starting April 12, and across Ontario on Wednesdays at
3:30 p.m., as of April 14.
Geared to Grades 7 to 13, the series is composed
of 12 adventure-based lectures, in which RCGS explorers and CMN
experts reveal their research findings and harrowing experiences.
In "Legs, Coils and Fangs," paleontologist Michael Caldwell
uses snake skeletons to describe a fossil field trip in Argentina.
In "Arctic Odyssey," Victoria Jason leads viewers through
a 7,500-kilometre Northwest Passage kayak trip. And paleontologist
Kathlyn Stewart shows images of herself sharing a hippopotamus
swimming hole in "Fossil Hunting in Africa."
The idea for the series was spawned by
the successful broadcast of two previous joint lectures. The
museum and the Society hope "It’s In Our Nature" can
dramatically multiply potential lecture audiences, from hundreds
of people to thousands.
"TV is a great way to get information
out to a lot of people," says Lorna Sierolawski, a CMN producer.
The producers also hope to air the series on "Cable in the
Classroom," educational programming broadcast by cable companies
to schools across the country, starting this spring.
Sierolawski admits lectures may not be
the most "TV-friendly" events. But attempts to jazz
things up — particularly by gathering participants onstage for
show-and-tell and questions — have loosened the atmosphere.
Hissing cockroaches aside, the informality heightens discussion.
"When the speakers are right in front of you, you can see
in their eyes how excited they are," says Sierolawski. "It
makes a big difference."
— A.L.
Turning Points
TO INAUGURATE
The Canadian Geographical Society with fanfare, its founders
invited Englishman Sir Francis Younghusband (left), then known
as "one of the greatest living explorers," to deliver
the Society’s first lecture in January 1930.
Younghusband recounted his 1904 journey
across the Himalayas to Tibet, where he concluded a British-Tibetan
trade treaty with the Dalai Lama. In recognition of the founding
of the Society, the explorer presented a Tibetan sword to the
CGS, which still remains in its care.
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