50 



DSDP originated in the micl-1960's as a modest at-sea portion of Project 

 Mohole. When Mohole succumbed to budget and technical problems, the ocean 

 component survived. It was intended to be an 18-month project carried out 

 by four U.S. oceanographic institutions. Operations began in 1968 with the 

 newly-built GLOMAR CHALLENGER, and the program immediately found itself at 

 the heart of the plate tectonics revolution. DSDP was quickly renewed for 

 five years, and several other U.S. institutions joined the program. 

 Scientific planning for the program was carried out by Joint Oceanographic 

 Institutions for Deep Earth Sampling (JOIDES), an association of the 

 participating institutions. 



In 1974, already extensive international participation was formalized by 

 establishment of IPOD -- the International Phase of Ocean Drilling. Five 

 countries joined the program: Federal Republic of Germany, France, Japan, 

 the USSR, and the United Kingdom. The USSR was active until 1979; the 

 other 4 countries remained as members throughout the remaining decade of 

 the DSDP. The conspicuous success of IPOD, both scientifically and 

 politically, made it an obvious model for future international cooperative 

 programs. 



THE TRANSITION TO THE OCEAN DRILLING PROGRAM 



During the final years of DSDP, several plans for a follow-on program were 

 considered. There was some sentiment for simply extending DSDP for an 

 additional 5 to 10 years, particularly because of the advent of a tool 

 called the Hydraulic-Piston Corer (HPC). The HPC enabled recovery of 

 virtually-undisturbed sediment cores, thus giving the infant science of 

 paleooceanography an enormous burst of productive data. 



However, the weight of opinion, especially in the international community, 

 was that the built-in technical limits of GLOMAR CHALLENGER were barriers 

 to much of the most exciting research being contemplated , in the next 

 decade. When CHALLENGER left the ways in 1968, she was a revolutionary 

 vessel, but a decade later, she had been surpassed by several generations 

 of bigger, more capable ships. The equipment could no longer meet the 

 demands of the science. : 



The last four years of DSDP operations resulted frpm a pair of two-year 

 "final" extensions. These short extensions were exceedingly difficult to 

 manage, especially in the international arena. Scientific planning became 

 an increasingly contentious matter, as proponents of current and proposed 

 new technology squared off. It became clear that DSDP/IPOD was nearing its 

 conclusion. 



Ocean Margin Drilling Program (OMDP), 1980-81 . OMDP would have been a U.S. 

 effort funded jointly by NSF and a consortium of U.S. oil companies. Using 

 the Government-owned GLOMAR EXPLORER converted for drilling with marine 

 riser and blowout preventers, 2 effort would have been concentrated on a few 

 relatively deep holes in passive margins. The passive margins are of great 

 interest to scientists because they hold information about early rifting of 

 the plates; they are of special interest to oil companies because of 

 possible concentrations of oil and gas. The program was abandoned 

 primarily because the oil companies lost interest as petroleum prices 

 dropped. 



