Hudson-70: The First Circumnavigation of the Americas

This year marks the fortieth anniversary of the departure of one of the last of the great globe-spanning multidisciplinary oceanographic expeditions, a tradition that included the epic voyages of Challenger, Meteor, and Albatross. During an expedition lasting 11 months, the Canadian oceanographic ship CSS Hudson of the Bedford Institute of Oceanography (BIO), Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, accomplished the first, and still the only, circumnavigation of the Americas. The vessel worked in the South Atlantic, Antarctic, Pacific, and Arctic oceans and was only the sixth ship to transit the Northwest Passage. On November 17, 2009, CCGS Hudson, still an operational research ship of the Canadian Coast Guard, will host a party at BIO to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the expedition, and a special exhibition is being mounted at BIO featuring films and photographs of the voyage.