Written By Ned Middleton

In the early sixties Jacques Cousteau was not quite the household name it would soon become.
“The Captain,” as he was affectionately known, was hard at work undertaking serious scientific experiments from his beloved Calypso - a converted WW2 Minesweeper, which was yet to become the most famous ship in the world. His biggest problem was always funding and whenever he was not engaged in some pioneering underwater project, he would be found using his persuasive talents in trying to prise big business from sufficient capital to allow him and his team to continue their work. The French government and the French oil industry were his main supporters.

In 1956, Cousteau had produced a film and a book entitled “The Silent World” - both of which were greeted with great critical acclaim with the film version gaining both an Oscar and the Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival. Five years later Cousteau returned to the USA to be honoured by President Kennedy himself who bestowed him with the National Geographic Society’s Gold Medal. On that medal were images of Calypso and her divers and the inscription read “To earthbound man he gave the key to the silent world.”

Conshelf I

Whilst always the showman, Cousteau remained - for the time being at least, a very seriously-minded scientist with a wish to take underwater experiments to new and much greater levels. He was also a man of great vision and one of his many ideas was the creation of underwater habitats where man could live and work on the very edge of any Continental Shelf. As this particular idea took hold in his mind, so the first of his Conshelf experiments took shape.

The greatest obstacle to this dream was, of course, man’s inability to remain underwater for very long before the nitrogen content of air saturated the body’s tissues. 60 years earlier, John Scott Haldane and the British Admiralty had published a series of decompression tables detailing how divers should ascend to the surface slowly in order to give the body time to rid itself of that excess nitrogen. Then, almost 50 years later, a US Navy physiologist named George Bond coined the term “Saturation Diving” by reasoning that once a diver’s body had become saturated with nitrogen (or helium) for a given depth, the time required for decompression would no longer increase simply because no more inert gases could be absorbed by the body and thus the decompression time was, therefore, already at it’s maximum.

Big oil and mineral companies were quick to realise the potential for using man underwater now that any decompression times for each depth had a finite limit. Nobody, however, had lived underwater for any period of time and there was no data regarding the medical, physical or psychological problems associated with life in such an environment. Many years earlier Sir Robert Davis (famous for the Davis submarine escape equipment) had produced plans for a manned underwater chamber but it was never more than theory. In 1957, however, Bond began to develop this idea and his work would eventually become the US Navy’s “Sealab” project of 1965.

2.
In the meantime, Cousteau had none of the resources available to the US Navy and, just as there was a race between the United States and the Soviet Union to put the first on the Moon, so there now began a similar race to build and occupy an underwater habitat. On 6 September 1962, the Belgian Diver Robert Stenuit remained underwater for a full 24 hours operating from a submerged recompression chamber at a depth of 61m (200’) in the Bay of Villefranche. Over 10 years later, incidentally, it was Stenuit who found the Spanish Armada Galleon “Girona” off the coast of Northern Ireland and magnanimously presented the entire content of that find to the Ulster Museum - as a gift to the people of Ulster. Eight days after Stenuit’s stay underwater, however, Cousteau’s chief diver Albert Falco and Claude Wesley spent a whole week inside Continental Shelf Station No 1 (Conshelf 1) at Pomégues in the Mediterranean. Conshelf 1 was over a year in the planning and as the two “Oceanauts” (a word Cousteau invented to counter current world interest in Astronauts) took to the water, Cousteau told the world “Falco and Wesley would be the first men to occupy the Continental Shelf without surfacing for a significant amount of time.” And so they were.

Every day they ventured outside for a daily routine of scientific tasks to depths of 25m. The habitat itself, was at a little over 10m and inside they ate gourmet meals, enjoyed hot showers and a large team of divers attended their every need. The normally calm Falco, however, suffered great nightmares and became increasingly bad tempered until Cousteau wisely changed the routine of interruptions and visitors so that the two men would get more peace. It worked.

Conshelf II

Whilst the scientific value of the experiments conducted by Falco and Wesley from Conshelf I were of limited value, the very essence of demonstrating how man could live underwater for a whole week was a great success and it was Cousteau who proved it so. For him, however, Conshelf 1 was only the first experiment in a 6 part project which would eventually put a team of divers into an underwater home 200m below the surface. Plans for Conshelf II were, therefore, already well advanced. This was much bigger and better than it’s predecessor. It was a luxury operation in two parts. Firstly, 5 divers would spend a month underwater in the main habitat called Starfish House and secondly, another two would spend a week at a much greater depths.

Albert Falco spent over a month searching for the ideal site in the Red Sea and eventually settled for Sha’ab Rumi about 25 miles north of Port Sudan. It was perfect. Meanwhile Cousteau was selecting the Oceanauts more for their social skills and less for their diving or scientific abilities. What was needed was a clear demonstration that a colony of divers could live together underwater without becoming wholly intolerable of each other.

Conshelf II comprised four main buildings and eight additional ancillary structures. Starfish House - so named because of it’s radiating legs, was an air-conditioned central base. This contained sleeping quarters for 8 people, kitchen, dining room, laboratory and dark room. The Deep Cabin was a large yellow diving bell anchored at 26m. Inside, it comprised of a wet cabin below and a dry cabin above in which 2 divers could live. With an open bottom, it was the air pressure which kept the water out. This was the habitat in which two divers would spend a whole week. Thirdly, there was a domed hangar for use as a garage for one of the underwater diving saucers which was normally based on Calypso. Finally, there was a wet hangar in which tools and scooters were housed when not in use. The ancillary structures comprised mainly of a ring of shark cages strategically placed so that divers could take refuge inside should they ever feel threatened.

3.
On the surface, the “Rosaldo” was permanently anchored above Starfish House in the sheltered lagoon. This ship served as the main HQ, power source, home and working environment for no fewer than 52 scientists, technicians, doctors, cameramen and divers in addition to the ship’s own crew. Calypso was also present but she had a roving commission and regularly shuttled back and forth to Port Sudan for fresh supplies. The whole elaborate programme was funded by a grant of US$1.2 million from the French National Petroleum Office after Cousteau had argued that drilling stations on the seabed would be safer and less expensive that surface-based platforms. He also reasoned that each Continental Shelf contained untold riches in minerals and that his Conshelf experiments would bring the dream of harvesting these riches closer to reality.

As the Oceanauts relaxed in their water-cooled and air-conditioned underwater environment. Life topside became almost unbearable as temperatures soared and humidity reached 100%. Cousteau was never overweight and he lost a further 20 lbs during the expedition. Life in the Deep Cabin was also uncomfortable and the two divers complained of “perspiring like fountains.” Nevertheless, despite a number of problems and setbacks, the 7 Oceanauts completed their respective projects and remained underwater as planned. Even Cousteau’s wife Simone decided to join the men in Starfish House and thus became the first woman to live underwater for any period of time.

Every day, each of the Oceanauts was given scientific experiments to conduct. First and foremost, however, this was an experiment in living underwater. All scientific projects were, therefore, secondary, to the findings determined from the effects of prolonged “saturation diving” on the participants themselves. Every morning a doctor would visit the Oceanauts and test their vital signs and reflexes and a number of curious observations were made. In an atmosphere of twice the amount of Oxygen than is found at the surface, beard growth was inhibited but minor wounds and cuts healed much faster. Working from the Deep Cabin, it was reckoned the breathing mixture would allow the two divers to operate daily to depths of 50m and make short trips to 100m. They actually reached 110m. Everything these men did was regarded as vital information to a medical team charged with the task of evaluating man’s ability to withstand such working conditions.

For decompression at the end of their stay, the Oceanauts breathed a mixture of 80% oxygen and 20% nitrogen for 2 hours. By pure coincidence they surfaced on Bastille Day - 14 July 1963 and were able to toast both their country’s freedom and the overall success of the mission.

Thousands of feet of film about the expedition were edited into a single movie entitled “World Without Sun” which premiered in the United States in December 1964. Cousteau received his second Oscar for the film but one notable newspaper critic suggested that certain science fiction fantasy elements had been added for effect. This was, of course, nonsense but such is the power of established critics that the seeds of doubt had been cast. Even when challenged personally by Cousteau, the critic refused to budge and said that one scene in particular “left the scientifically-minded wondering whether they are being hoaxed.” Such was the ignorance of the day!

Despite his growing reputation - which now included two Oscar-winning films, however, Cousteau found himself increasingly unable to compete with the Space Industry for both public attention and serious funding. He openly declared time and again that the sea would bring far greater rewards than space - only to watch with great envy as millions of dollars were poured into the space race whilst he struggled for contracts.

4.
Those funds that were allocated by the French government required Calypso to undertake additional projects as determined by them. In early 1964 this included towing and anchoring a 60m laboratory buoy so that it floated vertically at the surface in the Mediterranean somewhere between Nice and Corsica. Later that year they tested new seismic equipment before embarking on a geological and geophysical study of the Strait of Messina with a view to determining the feasibility of building a bridge between Sicily and the Italian mainland.

By now, Cousteau’s organisation included 190 personnel and he required US$2 million per year just to support those people in addition to their equipment and, of course, run Calypso. With a yearly grant from the National Geographic Society, research grants from the French Government and numerous small business grants - for specific projects, he was struggling to keep it all in place. Furthermore, the race for a habitat on the Continental Shelf was being continued by those who had the requisite funding.

Twelve weeks after Conshelf II was completed, George Bond placed the US Navy’s “Sealab I” onto the seabed at a depth of 58m off the coast of Bermuda. In a long oval structure which resembled a recompression chamber, four divers lived for 11 days - their underwater sojourn cut short by the threat of an approaching hurricane. Nevertheless, with the vast resources of the US Navy at his disposal, Bond was already at work on Sealab II. In the meantime Cousteau was struggling to finance the third of his 6 part plan to put man into ever deeper habitats on the seabed for even greater periods of time.

Conshelf III
Conshelf III was very different and involved a team of 6 divers living in a habitat at 100m in the Mediterranean near Île de Levant. Even though Cousteau wanted to reduce his reliance on surface support, Conshelf III required a back-up team of 150 technical and medical experts and 12 ships. The diving team included Phillipe Cousteau, who had just graduated from the French government’s college of motion pictures.

The spherical structure weighed 140 tonnes and was 6m in diameter. Inside it was divided into two halves with the upper chamber devoted to dining and communications and the lower to sleeping sanitation and diving. The Oceanauts worked in almost complete darkness and were virtually undisturbed by visitors because of the depths involved. The only exception being a daily visit from Cousteau himself in one of his saucers - from which he filmed the divers at work. The team breathed a mixture of 98% helium and 2% oxygen. Curiously, this lighter medium actually disrupted some of the machinery within the chamber. As far as the divers were concerned, this heliox mixture appeared to dull some of the body’s senses with both the sense of smell and taste seeming to disappear.

Once again, Cousteau’s pioneering team completed almost every single objective they had been set and yet another Conshelf experiment was successfully completed. By this time, Cousteau’s work in this field was far ahead of his contemporaries and when the team arrived back on the surface, Cousteau organised a massive public relations exercise to promote both the achievements and the forthcoming film. Unfortunately, the lighter-than-air breathing mixture causes the vocal chords to vibrate at a much faster rate - thus producing voices similar to Donald Duck. This led to considerable difficulties with the resultant film - which did not achieve the same level of success as it’s two predecessors.

5.
Despite the fact that Conshelf III was a great success, the eventual outcome drastically altered Cousteau’s perception of the direction his own life and career would now take. Throughout the world, he had been at the very forefront of experiments with underwater habitats in which he had shown the way ahead. Now, others with far more funding were building underwater habitats in The Bahamas, Canada, Cuba, Germany, Holland, Italy, Japan, UK, USA and USSR. Worst of all, Cousteau’s own funding for the continuation of his work was drying up. Executives from the French Petroleum Office who had been very impressed when they saw footage of complicated well-head repairs completed in a fraction of the time it took on the surface were, nevertheless, not convinced of the viability of permanent underwater habitats. They and other industrialists were turning more and more to sophisticated robots and un-manned submersibles. Even the French government withdrew their own funding because they considered Cousteau was becoming far too influenced by the USA.

Instead of proceeding with the remainder of his planned itinerary of 6 Conshelf experiments, therefore, Cousteau concluded that his future lie elsewhere - in television, and promptly contacted the National Geographic Society. The society agreed to promote the first hour-long Cousteau programme on the proviso that leading television producer David Wolper supervised the editing. Cousteau and Wolper became friends and the very first edition of “The World of Jacques Cousteau,” narrated by Orson Welles was broadcast to a huge American audience in April 1966. Neither the World, nor Jacques Cousteau were ever the same again.

The Experiments Re-Visited
I was staying in Port Sudan as a guest of Emperor Divers who have a new facility in the grounds of the Hilton Hotel only a few minutes stroll from the quayside where their day-boat “Empress Isa” is moored. Sha'ab Rumi - Arabic for Roman Reef, is a long. narrow underwater plateau stretching up from 600m. The reef itself is a fairly uniform depth of 20m dropping away to 40m at the edges. This reef is alive and thriving. All manner of soft and hard corals greet the diver in every direction. In amongst these are all the usual marine fishes one expects to find. We regularly saw Grey Reef Sharks and one Hammerhead. Steve has also seen the occasional Manta Ray, Silvertip and even a Silky Shark. On yet another dive we watched transfixed as schools of Barracuda circled almost lazily around us.

Today, all that remains of the 3 Conshelf experiments are the remnants of Conshelf II at Sha’ab Rumi. The domed and wet hangars are fairly intact and still in place on the seabed. A number of shark cages are also found although these are now broken and covered in corals. The domed hangar is easily the most exciting structure. Shaped liker the test of a Sea Urchin, it sits on 3 legs expertly placed so that the space between two of these faces the drop off. In this way, the manned submersible which Cousteau likened to a saucer could fall away from the hangar which was it’s underwater garage and quickly be on it’s way to whichever destination was on the agenda for that trip.

It says much for the original quality of build that this entire structure remains almost completely intact after 40 years underwater. The legs look as though they are good for at least another 40 years and this allows the diver to enter the building from below. Swimming upwards through the circular hatch into which the saucer was once clamped in place, we found the floor is made of iron bars and around the sides I noted that the water-tight windows had been removed.
6.

The integrity of the domed structure itself, however, is still sound - although, with those windows removed the water level inside is now just above the frames. There is, therefore, still a very large air pocket - although it will not be a good breathing mixture.

Nearby is the wet hangar which one housed the scooters and tools when not in use. It is small metal building resembling something like a very long kennel. Not overly exciting as such, it was too large to ignore but too small to enter. Elsewhere, the broken remains shark cages provide the visiting diver with nothing more than a glimpse of the equipment used in the days before divers began to understand a little something about these incredible creatures.

Emperor Divers of Port Sudan is the only shore-based diving and training facility in the entire country and has already been awarded the PADI Gold Palm 5 Star IDC certificate, put another way - even PADI say they are the best! Run by two very experienced and extremely amiable people - Steve and Miranda, this facility brings a refreshing blend of efficiency, friendliness and knowledge coupled with many years of diving experience gained from the Egyptian Red Sea. They are also the only Nitrox facility in the country and another important feature for “gas-guzzlers” like myself is that all their diving cylinders are 15L.

The massive natural harbour at Port Sudan is not only a very large and modern shipping terminal and container port, it is also crucial to the economy of the entire country. Consequently, small boats do not get priority and occasionally we had to wait while some large ship was allowed to proceed. Similarly, there are no boat movements into or out of the port at night time. Our diving was, therefore, limited to daily sailing from Port Sudan but we were still able to cover many of the dive sites only previously reached by liveaboard. In January 2004, Emperor Divers are taking delivery of their first Sudan-based liveaboard “Emperor Pegasus.” Well-known to divers in the Egyptian Red Sea, Pegasus can cover a normal two-week diving itinerary in just one week, and is already fully booked for 20 weeks! In the near future, they will also be taking delivery of a very fast Pirogue, which will allow day trips to much further afield.

Further Information:

“Cousteau - The Captain and his World” by Richard Munson (ISBN: 0-7090-4540-9).
20 Volume set “The Ocean World of Jacques Cousteau” - Volume VII - Man Re-enters the Sea.

The trip was arranged by Emperor Divers in conjunction with Regal Dive.

Emperor Divers:

Tel: 002 065 601735.
Fax: 002 069 601735
E-mail: reservations.sudan@emperordivers.com

Regal Dive:
Phone: 0870 2201 777
Fax: 01353 777897 or 776328
Email: info@regal-diving.co.uk