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A bathyscaphe is a metal sphere for diving attached to a flotation device used to change depth. The most famous is the Trieste, which reached the deepest point on earth. The bathysphere was the first version, and the bathyscaphe improved on it. It is filled with gasoline, which is replaced with water as it descends, decreasing buoyancy. Iron shot is held inside the craft by electromagnets, which is released to ascend.
A bathyscaphe is basically a bathysphere, a thick armored metal sphere for diving, attached to the bottom of a float or flotation device used to change depth. The bathyscaphe is used to investigate the depths of the sea. The most famous is the bathyscaphe Trieste, which reached the deepest point on the earth’s surface, the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, carrying two passengers, Jacques Piccard and Lieutenant Don Walsh. So few bathyscaphes were built that the term is often associated specifically with the Trieste.
The bathysphere began with the construction of the first bathysphere, designed by Otis Barton in 1928. The first bathysphere was hollow, with walls of cast steel 1 inch thick, 4.75 feet (1.5 m) in diameter. Fused quartz, the strongest transparent material available at the time, was used for the windows. Instead of being self-propelled like the Trieste, this first bathysphere was lowered into the depths on a cable. Oxygen was supplied via a pressurized container on the outside of the sphere and carbon dioxide removed by electric fans which circulated the air over pots containing soda lime.
The bathyscaphe was an improvement on the bathysphere, devised by the Swiss physicist, inventor and explorer Auguste Piccard. Initially interested in building atmospheric balloons, Piccard realized that a modification of some of these concepts would allow the construction of an aircraft capable of descending to the depths of the ocean. After much trial and error from the mid-1930s to the mid-1950s, Piccard invented a bathyscaphe suitable for use by the French Navy, which used it to send a man safely up to 13,700 ft (4,176 m) . This is very impressive, and even the most powerful modern nuclear submarines have a crushing depth of 730m (2,400ft).
The floating part of a bathyscaphe is filled with gasoline, which is nearly incompressible. As the bathyscaphe descends, it dumps gasoline, replacing it with water, decreasing the vessel’s buoyancy. Buckets of iron shot are held inside the craft by electromagnets. Once the vessel reaches the bottom, this shot is released to ascend. This is a fail-safe mechanism: even if the current fails, the shot is still released, so no one is trapped on the ocean floor.
The term bathyscaphe was created using the Greek words batys (“deep”) and skaphos (“ship”). Since the Trieste retired, most deep-sea submarines have been robotic only.
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