A Tucson native who grew up watching ocean exploration livestreams while studying at the University of Arizona will soon be on the ship doing the exploring.

Adam Harper, a recent UA graduate and Catalina Foothills High School alumnus, has been selected as a 2026 Video Systems Engineering Intern with the Ocean Exploration Trust’s Science and Engineering Internship Program. This August and September, he will sail aboard the Exploration Vessel Nautilus on a 30-day expedition to the waters surrounding Wake Island — one of the most isolated land masses on Earth, roughly midway between Hawaii and the Mariana Islands.

Harper was chosen from hundreds of applicants as one of 19 interns joining the crew.

“This is a tremendous opportunity that I have dreamed about for years,” Harper said. “I still remember studying at the ENR2 Building on campus with the E/V Nautilus livestream on in the background and wondering if this young desert boy would be able to pioneer the seven seas one day.”

The expedition will use remotely operated vehicles, seafloor mapping systems and telepresence technology to gather baseline scientific data across a largely unexplored region. The team will focus on science priorities of the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument, including abyssal plain habitats, unexplored seamounts and potential maritime heritage sites connected to the Battle of Wake Island.

As a video systems intern, Harper will operate camera controls for the ship’s surface and subsea video systems and work alongside lead engineers on the operation and maintenance of all video equipment aboard the Nautilus.

The Ocean Exploration Trust is a nonprofit founded by Dr. Robert Ballard — the oceanographer who located the wreck of the Titanic — with a mission to explore unknown regions of the deep ocean and share those discoveries with the public in real time. The organization streams expeditions live at NautilusLive.org, 24 hours a day, allowing anyone to follow along from shore.

Schools, summer programs and community groups can schedule free, live one-on-one question-and-answer sessions with crew members aboard the ship during the expedition.

The 2026 E/V Nautilus expeditions are supported by NOAA Ocean Exploration through the Ocean Exploration Cooperative Institute, with additional support from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and several private partners.

To watch Harper and the crew explore the Pacific in real time, visit NautilusLive.org.