The History Behind the R/V Nancy Foster
June 6, 2007

The R/V Nancy Foster is a well-equipped floating laboratory, however it was not originally designed as so.  The ship was originally built as a Navy yard torpedo shallow water test craft.  In 2001, the Navy transferred the vessel to NOAA and NOAA outfitted the ship to conduct coastal research along the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf coasts in addition to the Caribbean Sea.  Bow thrusters have since replaced torpedo storage areas and she is now capable of trawling for bottom fish, sediment sampling, conducting side-scan and multi-beam surveys, providing support for an ROV and AUV, and servicing oceanographic/ atmospheric surface and subsurface buoys.  She is currently the only NOAA vessel that can support this multitude of tasks that facilitate NOAA executing its mission!

Her home port is Charleston, SC.  The R/V Nancy Foster is 187-feet long and supports 5 commissioned officers, 3 licensed technicians, one survey technician, 10 crew, and up to 15 scientists.  She spent several months at the Navy shipyard in Charleston undergoing a transition to a research vessel.  She now has a wet lab, a dry lab, dive platform, an aft deck crane, and a main deck crane that can lift up to 10,000 lbs of support vessels or other equipment.  She also has an “A” frame and a “J” frame for lifting other equipment into the water such as the CTD and the AUV. 

The R/V Nancy Foster is named for Dr. Nancy Foster, in tribute to her outstanding contributions in advancing NOAA’s mission through her leadership within the National Marine Fisheries Service and National Ocean Service from 1986 until 2000.

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