If you haven’t yet heard about Roz Savage, then today’s your lucky day. You’re about to “meet” an incredible woman who has rowed solo across the Atlantic Ocean and is currently working towards being the first woman to row solo across the Pacific Ocean. And she’s not just doing it for fame and fortune, she’s trying to raise the global consciousness of environmental issues and climate change.  Over the past several years, Roz has become an author, a motivational speaker, a blogger / podcaster, and an environmentalist in addition to an adventurer.

Roz is currently in Hawaii, having rowed here from San Francisco on a voyage that took about 100 days and a million oar strokes. She will be starting the next leg of her journey on May 24th, which will take her about halfway to Australia where she’ll stopover on a to-be-determined island. She’ll then continue from there to Australia in the fall of 2010, with the goal of arriving in time to see the New Year’s fireworks in Sydney.

Recently, I attended one of Roz’s talks (at Oceanit) with a few of my co-workers from Archinoetics. We were so inspired by her, that our company decided to get involved. So, Roz will be taking with her one of our ocean drifter devices (photo below) that we’ve developed for our ocean education program, called Project Niu. Roz will keep the sensor on her boat until she reaches the equator, at which point she’ll drop it into the ocean. From then on, the Niu will float with the currents, simulating marine debris and showing what happens to plastic and other floating pollution in the oceans.

Additionally, Archinoetics is also working on the RozTracker, an interactive Flash-based mapping application (using Google Maps) that will show Roz’s progress as she rows across the Pacific Ocean. Based on technology we developed for Project Niu, the RozTracker will also feature icons for geolocated social media (Twitter, Blogger, YouTube, Flickr, and podcasts) so all of Roz’s followers can stay up to date with how she’s doing.

I really encourage you to check out the Roz Savage website and watch her videos. Amazing!!! GO ROZ!!!

Roz Savage & Archinoetics