Robert Ballard Quotes

You don’t go to Gettysburg with a shovel, you don’t take belt buckles off the Arizona.

Where I live in Connecticut was ice a mile above my house, all the way back to the North Pole, about 15 million kilometers, that’s a big ice cube. But then it started to melt. We’re talking about the floods of our living history.

What drives me is exploration with a purpose, more the classic Royal Geographical Society genre.

Well, when I was a kid, I grew up in San Diego next to the ocean. The ocean was my friend – my best friend.

There’s probably more history now preserved underwater than in all the museums of the world combined. And there’s no law governing that history. It’s finders keepers.

There’s a long list of technologies that have now made it possible to carry out very precise search efforts in the deep sea.

The body is sort of a pain. It has to go to the bathroom. It has to be comfortable. But the spirit is indestructible. It can move at the speed of light.

So, you know, I think the age of exploration is just beginning, not ending, on our planet.

My family came in 1635 from England and settled in Williamsburg. Shortly after, they split up; half went to New England and half stayed in Virginia. I’m a Virginian Ballard.

It’s not a huge surprise that there are habitations at the bottom of the Black Sea.

I would have to say my favorite place on Earth is Bora Bora.

I mean, there is amazing amount of oil and gas and other resources out beneath the sea. It’s staggering.

I mean, technology is amoral. It has no morality.

I can’t travel without Sudoku.

I am really dedicated to understanding the planet/creature on which we live and know that means I must go beneath the sea to see 72 percent of what is going on.

I am an underwater explorer, not a treasure hunter.