Science: The Lower Depths

The Belgian ship Scaldis was due to sail from Antwerp last week. The important cargo was the “bathyscaphe” designed by Professor Auguste (“Captain Nemo”) Piccard, 64, of balloon fame.* In the Gulf of Guinea, West Africa, the bathyscaphe will be lowered overboard with the professor and his coadventurer, Professor Max Cosyns, inside. Piccard expects to descend to a depth of 2½ miles.

The bathyscaphe, long abuilding (TIME, July 8, 1946; Aug. 18, 1947) is a steel sphere 6½ feet in outside diameter with thick walls to resist the enormous underwater pressure. It will not be suspended from a cable, like William Beebe’s bathysphere (which set a 3,000-ft. depth record in 1934). The Piccard sphere will float like a balloon in the ocean depths, supported by tanks filled with buoyant gasoline. A heavy iron keel attached by electromagnets will cause the sphere to sink. To rise, Piccard will cut the electric current and release the keel. The bathyscaphe can cruise slowly by means of two propellers driven by a small electric motor. A searchlight will seek out whatever sea monsters live in the Gulf of Guinea.

*Not to be confused with his equally long-haired twin brother Dr. Jean Piccard, also a stratosphere balloonist.