These and many other improvements carried 

 TRIESTE to 10,392 feet by September 1954 

 off Ponza, Italy. 



In 1957 the U.S. Navy's Office of Naval 

 Research provided funds for a series of 26 

 dives by its civilian oceanographers and na- 

 val officers out of TRIESTE^s home port of 

 Castellemare (6). Encouraged by this new 

 approach to deep-sea studies, the Navy pur- 

 chased TRIESTE in 1958 from Auguste Pic- 

 card for $250,000 (7) and transported it to 

 San Diego, California where it came under 

 control of the Navy Electronics Laboratory 

 (now the Naval Undersea Center). At NEL, 

 TRIESTE received a facelifting in the form 

 of a new pressure sphere, built by the Ger- 

 man firm of Krupp, which allowed it to oper- 

 ate to a depth of 36,000 feet (the Terni sphere 

 was limited to 20,000 feet) and an increase in 

 the float of 6,200 gallons to accommodate the 

 new 28,665-pound sphere (8). 



By mid-October 1959 TRIESTE (Fig. 3.5) 

 was fully assembled and made ready for its 

 first deep-sea dives off Guam under the aegis 

 of Project NEKTON. The French-held record 

 by FNRS-3 fell on 15 November 1959 with a 

 dive to 18,105 feet with Jacques Piccard and 

 NEL biologist. Dr. Andres Rechnitzer, 

 aboard TRIESTE. Eight dives later, on 8 

 January 1960, a 22,560-foot dive by Piccard 

 and Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh saw this 

 record fall, and on the next dive, Piccard and 

 Walsh reached the very bottom of the Chal- 

 lenger Deep: 35,800 feet on 23 January 

 I960— the contest was over. TRIESTE dem- 

 onstrated that any ocean depth could be 

 safely reached. The drama of these early 

 years is presented in detail by Auguste Pic- 

 card (3), Captain Houot (5) and Jacques Pic- 

 card (9) in their books which chronicle the 

 pioneering events leading up to the 1960 

 dive; for this reason the many technical 

 problems and discouragements along the 

 way are left out of the preceding account. 



Just north of TRIESTE'S earlier port at 

 Castellemare was a little noticed effort to 

 build a deep-diving vehicle, but in this case 

 the Italian builder, Pietro Vassena, intended 

 to build a submersible for the recovery of 

 wrecked ships (10). The submersible (Fig. 3.6) 

 was constructed from a "torpedo snorkel" 

 submarine built during the war. As early as 

 13 March 1948, Mr. Vassena and a companion 



Fig 3.5 TRIESTE just prior to its Deep Dive (Larry Stiurrtaker) 



Fig. 3-6 Pietro Vassena in ttie conning tower of his submersibte for the recovery of 

 wrecked ships (Gianfranco Vassena) 



39 



