![]() It has a portly white hull with a metallic crew sphere protruding from the front of its belly, and a bright red fin up top. “It really opens up a lot of opportunities.”Īlvin is a cross between a robotic laboratory and excavator. ![]() “We’ll have access to almost the full ocean,” says Strickrott. This upgrade alone will extend Alvin’s maximum depth by more than a mile and put approximately 99 percent of the seafloor within its reach. Arguably the most important improvement is Alvin’s new titanium ballast spheres and a pressurized crew compartment that will enable the submarine to carry up to three occupants just over four miles below the surface. During that trip, he and a team of oceanographers and US Navy observers will push the submarine to 6,500 meters-far deeper than it has ever gone before.Įarlier this month, Strickrott and a small team from Woods Hole presented the progress on Alvin’s upgrades at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union, which was held remotely as a precaution against the pandemic. When Alvin hits the water again next autumn for a trip into abyssal trenches near Puerto Rico, Strickrott will be among the first to pilot what is effectively a brand new vessel. By the time Alvin’s makeover is wrapped up in late 2021, the storied submarine will rank among the most capable human-rated deep sea submersibles in the world. Since the end of that expedition, Alvin has been ashore getting a major upgrade at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, which operates the submersible on behalf of the US Navy. Alvin makes dozens of trips to the seabed every year, but the mission to the methane seep this spring marked a milestone in Strickrott’s career as an explorer: It was the last time that the sub would have meaningful limits on how deep it could dive. Since he first started working on Alvin as an engineer nearly 25 years ago, Strickrott has logged more than 2,000 hours in the deep ocean, where he learned to expertly navigate the seabed’s alien landscape and probe for samples with the submarine’s spindly robotic arms. It was the final dive of a month-long expedition that had taken the crew from the Gulf of Mexico up the East Coast, with stops along the way to explore a massive deep sea coral reef that had recently been discovered off the coast of South Carolina.įor Bruce Strickrott, Alvin’s chief pilot and the leader of the expedition, these sorts of missions to the bottom of the world are a regular part of life. The submarine’s pilot and two marine scientists had just returned from collecting samples around a methane seep, an oasis for carbon-munching microbes and the larger species of bottom dwellers that feed on them. Underwater vessels including submarines don’t generally appear in the personal collectibles, but the Triton 3300/6 presents itself as a noteworthy exception that has the potential to redefine and reshape the boundaries of submersibles.In early March, a gleaming white submarine called Alvin surfaced off the Atlantic coast of North Carolina after spending the afternoon thousands of feet below the surface. Triton 3300/6 extraordinary interior space measures five cubic meters in total and provides ample leg, head, and elbow room for all onboard passengers, equipment, and other essentials for extended deep water explorations. Certified to reach a depth of 1,000 meters (3,280 ft), the sub is delivered in Tiffany blue exterior and has spacious and luxurious ‘club-class’ seating arrangement that can be effortlessly re-arranged from six to four-seat configuration or vice versa, when required. In a way, it is similar to the U-Boat Worx submersible which is also tailored for comfortable underwater escapades.Ĭonceived and supplied by Florida-based Triton Submarines – that projects its $5.5million submarine as “a salon under the sea”- the Triton 3300/6 has the world’s largest capacity transparent acrylic compartment, which offers the occupants the most spectacular panoramic underwater views of the enigmatic underwater life. ![]() Opening up the oceans for a new take on personal exploration, Triton 3300/6 is an acrylic-hulled submersible that employs exceptional seating arrangement to accommodate six passengers on an uninterrupted journey of the deep ends of the ocean. However, how you traverse the world underwater is what makes or breaks the overall experience. There’s rich and then there is Richie Rich like being rich! If you have millions of dollars to spare, there are no limits to the oceanic vistas you can explore.
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