The United Kingdom has been investing in the latest and newest state-of-the-art polar research vesssel, but the only thing lacking is the name.
Suggestions, as told by NPR, were Shackleton, Falcon, Ice Ice Baby, It's Bloody Cold Here, Endeavour and Boaty McBoatface. By popular demand according to Britain's Natural Environment Research Council, the most "inspirational name" that exmeplifies the vesel's mission is "Boaty McBoatface."
The ship-naming was lead by Jo Johnson, the minister of universities and science. In the NERC press release, Jo said that "the polar research ship represents a leap forward in securing Britain's place as a world leader in marine and climate change science - and illustrates this government's commitment to invest in research facilities on a record scale."
Which is a wonder why the public has chosen Boaty McBoatface as the name to be emblazoned on the vessel that would travel to the Antarctic.
The man responsible for the name is former BBC radio host James Hand who started the idea as a joke. "I've actually been speaking to the people behind the website," he told BBC Radio. "It's actually nothing to do with me. It was my suggestion but the storm that has been created, it's got legs of its own."
When it went viral, he went to Twitter to relay his excitement: "Thanks! I've got my fingers firmly crossed."
The internet went haywire after learning of the ship-naming poll. According to BBC, the Boaty McBoatface name went on a full-scale landslide with 27,000 votes. At one point, they even broke the internet when the website experienced technical issues because of the "overwhelming interest."
Regardless of what the outcome of the poll will be, Alison Robinson, NERC's director of Corporate Affairs was happy that people are embracing the ship-naming idea in the name of fun. However, NERC will still have the final say over the boat's name -which would mean that Boaty McBoatface may not be the vessel's name.
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