Fortunately, Cdr. Robert H. Woods, Commanding Officer of the Naval Air 

 Development Unit, and Cdr. Hoel, also of NADU, were in Washington on 

 some other business and the problem was discussed with them. They were 

 both interested, even enthusiastic about our project. We talked about using 

 two of NADU's blimps to do the job. Their stability, slow motion and free- 

 dom from vibration were particularly appealing. At last, operational people 

 were interested in helping us. In the next few months the officers and men 

 at NADU accepted each problem in the series of many to be overcome in our 

 job as a challenge and made it a point to find the best answer in each case. 

 It is impossible to give NADU too much credit for the magnificent job they 

 did for us. 



On 16 July 1954, an interoffice memorandum was written explaining the 

 necessity of assigning a priority of "B" to our project with NADU. The 

 stringent weather requirements we had to meet and the necessity of being 

 able to plan well in advance in order to have the WHOI R/V ATLANTIS, the 

 NADU airships, and the weather all be at the right place at the same time 

 were outlined. The priority was granted and on 19 July a letter was sent 

 from ONR to NADU setting up a project directive for the accomplishment 

 of SWOP. An abstract of the project contained in this letter will provide 

 some idea of the plans at this point: 



"The Naval Air Development Unit will make one flight 

 consisting of two aircraft (equipped with trimetrogon 

 cameras and an FM radio link for the purpose of triggering 

 the two cann.eras simultaneously) to a target area approximately 

 300 to 400 miles out over the North Atlantic. The Woods Hole 

 Oceanographic Institution research vessel "Atlantis" will be 



