Susan R. Eaton

A geoscientist, journalist and explorer, Susan R. Eaton studies the interplay of plate tectonics, oceans, glaciers, climate and life in polar regions.

A Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, Susan explores the world’s oceans—from Antarctica to the Arctic—in the snorkel zone, a unique land-sea-ice-air interface where charismatic animals and snorkelers comingle.

In 2018, Ocean Geographic named Susan one of the “Ocean’s Best” 18 most influential women leaders in ocean conservation.

Twelve years ago, Susan suffered a scuba diving trauma that landed her in a hyperbaric chamber for three days, ending her 30-year diving career. Undaunted, her up-close-and-personal relationship with the ocean—which had included studying marine biology and teaching scuba diving—didn’t end in the hyperbaric chamber…

Redefining her relationship with the ocean, Susan has snorkeled with thousands of chatty belugas Hudson Bay and with docile manatees at Crystal River, Florida. She’s snorkeled in the Galapagos Archipelago where sea turtles, sea lions and nurse sharks outnumber snorkelers. In Haida Gwaii, she’s assisted the Haida Nation, snorkeling northern rivers to count salmon migrating to their ancestral spawning grounds. Susan has come face-to-mask with charging 1,400-pound leopard seals in the Southern Ocean—so close, in fact, that she could count the freckles on their upper palates and inspect their tri-serrated teeth which dispatch 30-pound penguins in mere minutes.

On Canada’s 150^th birthday in 2017, Susan was honoured to be included in the book by Paulina Cameron, entitled “Canada 150 Women: Conversations with Leaders, Champions and Luminaries.”

In 2015, the Royal Canadian Geographical Society named Susan one of Canada’s top 100 modern-day explorers and trailblazers. A year later, the same organization named her one of Canada’s 25 greatest female explorers.

Martial Glacier, Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina

TELUS Spark: Meet an Innovator Susan R. Eaton

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