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us to “fly” the camera, pull it at speeds of about 2 miles per hour over 
the ocean floor while we make continuous observations. 
This is a picture of the gear as we were lowering it in the Atlantic 
on the Blake Plateau. It might interest you, gentlemen that the ship 
in the background is a Russian trawler mother ship which normally 
observes our activities. 
Here is a slide showing the tripod going over the side. 
Here is a photograph of the TV screen showing a sea floor deposit. 
When this occurs there is joy aboard the Prospector. 
This gives you an idea of the clarity of the TV image in depths 
now of up to 18,000 feet. In order to preserve this information we 
make video tapes. On the Blake Plateau we have video taped a deposit 
in its entirety and after experimenting with our prototype recovery 
rig we expect to reexamine the area and determine the efficiency of 
recovery process. | 
We are also capable of making voice recordings on the video tape 
to give location and other data. 
These are the Blake nodules in an area that we have designated as 
station 20 where we expect to operate the prototype rig next summer. 
Every so often there must be some sadness and this is part of the 
sea floor which we do not expect to exploit. The reason for showing 
you this is that, in spite of some of the literature, the ocean floor is 
not uniformly paved with these deposits. They are in selected areas 
and, although there are huge areas, nodules are not everywhere. 
This shows a dredge haul of the Blake Plateau nodules—this is 
rudimentary but effective testing equipment. This is the way we 
recover the nodules. 
This again is a different type of dredge but it is a tool for recovering 
enough nodules to do the research necessary, in this case the processing 
research. 
The nodules have a specific gravity of only about 21% and the quan- 
tity shown in the slide represents perhaps three-quarters of a ton of 
nodules. 
Here is a closeup view of the nodules showing that they are fre- 
quently embedded in sandstone or silicates. We sometimes obtain 
sponges and other marine life in this exercise but the data that we 
have gathered suggests that we should be able to successfully separate, 
at the sea floor, the nodules from the other materials and to bring the 
nodules to the surface without damaging the ecology of the ocean. 
In other areas the manganese oxides form as pavements and a great 
deal of publicity has been given to these. They are frequently of higher 
assay than the aotthiles but they present a much more difficult recovery 
problem and we are not, at this time, considering the mining techniques 
for their recovery. 
This haul of nodules is the result of one trip. This tonnage has been 
moved to Gloucester, Va., for the processing plant experimentation. 
The ship, of course, does a great deal of photography and is 
equipped with a photographie laboratory that can handle both still and 
movie films so that we can see what we have in the records before we 
leave the area. 
This is the ship’s electronics shop, since electronics and sea water 
normally mean trouble. 
