NOAA’s flagship calls Charleston its home port, even though it’s rarely home BY SUSAN HILL SMITH | PHOTOS BY MIC SMITH
THE RIGHT CHOICE Capt. Dan Simon’s decision 20 years ago to pass up corporate life for the NOAA Corps is rewarded by spectacular views from the bridge of the Ron Brown.
He could have taken a cushy, conventional job working in a private-sector lab in Pennsylvania after he finished his master’s degree in environmental studies. But he chose adventure instead, signing up with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Corps for a career that has already taken him to the ends of the Earth. These days, Capt. Dan Simon serves as commander of NOAA’s largest oceanographic research vessel, the Ronald H. Brown, which calls the port of Charleston home, even though it spends months and even years at sea, often oceans away from South Carolina. And sometimes when he looks out on the horizon, he thinks back to the job he turned down, and remembers the window overlooking a highway in what would have been his office. “The view from the (ship’s) bridge is amazing,” the 44-year-old commander says with a smile while leading a tour of the Ron Brown as it’s docked at the old Navy base in North Charleston during a travel break earlier this year. “I made the right choice.” For Simon, that choice goes beyond the view and the exciting unpredictability of what might happen next on the high seas, where the ship might collide with monsoons, hurricanes and even modern-day pirates. His main purpose is enabling NOAA’s critical research and data collection to further the understanding of oceans,
SCLIVING.COOP | JUNE 2019 | SOUTH CAROLINA LIVING
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