Bathysphere: Historical Photos of the World’s First Deep-Sea Exploration Vessel

[Brajeshwar]

https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/bathysphere-old-photos/

[duskwuff]

Probably worth pointing out that most of the text of this article is excerpted (without attribution) from the Wikipedia article:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathysphere

[squidhunter]

The book "Descent: The Heroic Discovery of the Abyss" by Bradford Matsen is all about Otis Barton, William Beebe, and the Bathysphere. The idea of locking yourself into a steel sphere and descending an order of magnitude deeper than any human had previously (and coming back alive) is wild. It's an excellent book that I found at a used book sale and it kinda sent me into a deep sea exploration rabbit hole. "Seven Miles Down: The Story of the Bathyscaph Trieste" by Jacques Piccard descending down to the bottom of the Challenger Deep is also a good one.

[JKCalhoun]

Also nice to see the mention of the Piccards. Ballooning to the highest altitudes on Earth and descending to Earth's depths as well. (And there is the Star Trek: TNG connection of course.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auguste_Piccard

[tempodox]

So the bathyspheres in Bioshock have a real-life precursor. Fascinating!

[ljf]

If you enjoyed this - check out this timeline of undersea 'vehicles' some great images and detail about each one. https://cyberneticzoo.com/early-underwater-manipulators-and-...

[empressplay]

The Royal BC Museum in Victoria BC for a number of years had an exhibit that featured a film of a descent in a bathysphere, you can watch it here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChOywETthqg

[dieselgate]

Wow the photo at the top gave me “a good type” of chills.

I’ve read about the “Jesus nut” which was used as a singular nut to fix a helicopter blade and the Bathysphere definitely has a single nut on that shackle from what I can see

[onos]

name from the greek βαθύς = deep https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CE%B2%CE%B1%CE%B8%CF%8D%CF%8...