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Full text of 'Volume 31, Number 4, Winter 1988/89mmISSN 0029-8182Oceanus'The International Magazine of Marine Science and PolicyVolume 31, Number 4, Winter 1988/89Frederic Golden, Acting EditorT. Hawley, Assistant EditorSara L.

Ellis, Editorial AssistantPlummy K. Tucker, InternEditorial Advisory Board1930James M. Broadus, Director, Marine Policy Center, Woods Hole Oceanographic InstitutionHenry Charnock, Professor of Physical Oceanography, University of Southampton, EnglandGotthilf Hempel, Director of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar Research, West GermanyCharles D. Hollister, Dean of Graduate Studies, Woods Hole Oceanographic InstitutionJohn Imbrie, Henry L. Doherty Professor of Oceanography, Brown UniversityJohn A. Knauss, Professor of Oceanography, University of Rhode IslandArthur E. Maxwell, Director of the Institute for Geophysics, University of TexasTimothy R.

Parsons, Professor, Institute of Oceanography, University of British Columbia, CanadaAllan R. Robinson, Gordon McKay Professor of Geophysical Fluid Dynamics, Harvard UniversityDavid A. Ross, Chairman, Department of Geology and Geophysics, and Sea Grant Coordinator,Woods Hole Oceanographic InstitutionPublished by the Woods Hole Oceanographic InstitutionGuy W.

Nichols, Chairman, Board of TrusteesJames S. Coles, President of the AssociatesJohn H. Steele, President of the Corporationand Director of the InstitutionPermission to photocopy forinternal or personal use or theinternal or personal use ofspecific clients is granted byOceanus magazine to librariesand other users registeredwith the Copyright ClearanceCenter (CCC), provided thatthe base fee of $2.00 per copyof the article, plus.05 perpage is paid directly to CCC,21 Congress Street, Salem, MA01970. Special requests shouldbe addressed to Oceanusmagazine.ISSN 0029-8182/83 $2. 00 +.05The views expressed in Oceanus are those of the authors and do notnecessarily reflect those of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.Editorial correspondence: Oceanus magazine, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution,Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543.

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Claims for missing numbers from:he U.S. And Canada will be honored within 3 months of publication; overseas, 5 months.GiveGiftof the1930comeaboardyourselfnowOceanusThe International Magazineof Marine Science and PolicyPublished by Woods HoleOceanographic InstitutionDomestic Subscription Order Form: U.S. & Canada 1Please make checks payable to Woods Hole Oceanographic InstitutionPlease enter my subscription to OCEANUS forIndividualD one year at $22.00 D payment em losed.El two years at $39.00 (we it-quest prepayment)D three vears at $56.00 D bill meI ibrary or Institution:D one year at $50.00Please send MY Subscription to:Please send a GIFT Subscription to:Name(please print)Street addressCity State Zip'Subscribers other than U.S. Canada please use tor ininserted at last page. Canadian subscribers add $3.00 peryear for postage.9/8894 IndexName(please print)Street addressCityDonor's NameAddressStateZipRemembered, 61Acclaimed, 68COVER: The painting of DSVAlvin, especially commissioned for this issue of Oceanus, was done by GeorgeWarren Delano, of West Harwich, Massachusetts, an artist well known on Cape Cod for his paintings ofyachts.Copyright 1988 by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Oceanus (ISSN 0029-8182) is published inMarch, June, September, and December by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 93 Water Street,Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543. Second-class postage paid at Falmouth, Massachusetts; Windsor, Ontario;and additional mailing points.

POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Oceanus Subscriber Service Center,P.O. Box 6419, Syracuse, N.Y. 13217.IHAS THE SUBSCRIPTION COUPON BEEN DETACHED?If someone else hasmade use of thecoupon attached tothis card, you can stillsubscribe. Just send acheck-$22 for oneyear (four issues), $39for two, $56 forthree- -to this address:Woods HoleOceanographicInstitutionWoods Hole, Mass.02543Please make checkspayable to WoodsHole OceanographicInstitutionJ93OOceanusWoods Hole Oceanographic InstitutionWoods Hole, Mass. 02543Subscription correspondence, U.S. And Canada: All orders should be addressed to Oceanus SubscriberService Center, P.O. Box 6419, Syracuse, N.Y.

Individual subscription rate: $22 a year; Librariesand institutions, $50. Current copy price, $5.50; 25 percent discount on current copy orders for 5 ormore; 40 percent discount to bookstores and newsstands. Please make checks payable to theWoods Hole Oceanographic Institution.Subscribers outside the U.S. And Canada, please write: Oceanus, Cambridge University Press, TheEdinburgh Building, Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 2RU, England.

Individual subscription rate:20 a year; Students, 17; Libraries and Institutions, 37. Single copy price, 9. Please make checkspayable to Cambridge University Press.When sending change of address, please include mailing label. Claims for missing numbers from:he U.S. And Canada will be honored within 3 months of publication; overseas, 5 months.Celebrated, 2Baptised, 10Pressurized, 28Vented, 41Star-crossed, 53Remembered, 61A Tribute to DSV Alvin2 Introduction: A Quarter-Century Under the Seaby Frederic Golden10 The Birth of Alvinby Ally n C. Vine1 7 Some Dangers and Many Delightsby Dudley Foster22 'Captain Hook's' Hunt for the H-Bombby Marvin J.

McCamis28 Lessons from the Alvin Lunchby Holger W. Jannasch34 A Famously Successful Expedition to the Boundary of Creationby Victoria A. Kaharl41 A Plethora of Unexpected Lifeby J. Frederick Grassle47 Do 'Eyeless' Shrimp See the Light of Glowing Deep-Sea Vents?by Cindy Lee Van Dover53 Resting In Piecesby Elazar Uchupi, Robert D. Ballard, and William N. Lange61 Allyn Collins Vine: Man of Visionby Sara L Ellis8968 Titanic and Leviathanby Gerald Weissmann78 Trouble for British Marine Scientistsby Henry Charnock83 When the Coastwise Trade Meets the EEZby Mark Asp in wall/Books Received94 IndexAcclaimed, 68COVER: The painting of DSV Alvin, especially commissioned for this issue of Oceanus, was done by GeorgeWarren Delano, of West Harwich, Massachusetts, an artist well known on Cape Cod for his paintings ofyachts.Copyright 1988 by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

Oceanus (ISSN 0029-8182) is published inMarch, June, September, and December by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 93 Water Street,Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543. Second-class postage paid at Falmouth, Massachusetts; Windsor, Ontario;and additional mailing points. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Oceanus Subscriber Service Center,P.O. Box 6419, Syracuse, N.Y.

13217.IIllustration by E. Paul OberlanderUnder the Seaby Frederic Golden/AS sea-going vessels go, it won't win any beautyprizes.

Stubby and bulbous, with a Cyclopeaneye, it looks like something out of Jules Verne,interpreted by Walt Disney. One writer called it apuffed-up blowfish, another a little poodle.Certainly, its name doesn't have a heroic ring,like Nautilus, say. Yet whatever its shortcomingsof line or pedigree, DSV (Deep SubmergenceVehicle) Alvin has won for itself an enduring'-': 'the annals of ocean science and in theI-'JKfcALVIN 64 SK89287-OOfSS 25 TH ANNIV. 4 ATI AMTIP.MID-ATLANTICRIDGEictoria A.

KaharlFRACTURE ZONE AFRACTURE ZONE BRIFTCourtesy of National Geographic Society 7975I he idea came out of diplomacy, not science. In1967, the executive secretary of President LyndonJohnson's cabinet-level Marine Council, EdWenk, opened discussions with other countriesin hopes of initiating joint oceanographicVictoria A.

Kaharl is a science writer in residence at theWoods Hole Oceanographic Institution. This article isexcerpted from a chapter of her forthcoming book onthe history of Alvin and its contributions to oceanscience, to be published by Oxford University Press.34projects with them. Long an enthusiasticproponent of deep-diving submarines he haddesigned Aluminaut Wenk found a kindredspirit in Yves LaPrairie, director of CNEXO(Centre National pour L'Exploitation des Oceans),France's chief oceanographic agency.In the course of several meetings betweenthem, a bold plan emerged. LaPrairie and Wenkproposed a joint French-American expedition tothe Mid-Atlantic Ridge, the mountain range thatbisects the Atlantic Ocean. Almost none of them.Bi.- j=.Departing from Woods Ho/e on June 4, with Alvin aboard (near stern) and Lulu /'n tow, R/V Knorr begins the trip toProject FAMOUS's home port, Ponta Delgada in the Azores. (Photo courtesy of WHOI)deep ocean had ever been visited before.

Thescheme, endorsed by Presidents Charles deGaulle and Richard Nixon, tantalized manyoceanographers. Jim Heirtzler, Bob Ballard, BillBryan, and Joe Phillips of the Woods HoleOceanographic Institution (WHOI) promptlymoved to take WHOI's research submersibleAlvin on that dramatic voyage. Alvin had onlyrecently been fitted out with a new titaniumpressure hull and its depth limit had beenextended to 10,000 feet, easily within range ofthe ridge.Many oceanographers still had theirdoubts about the scientific worth of gettinginside the deep ocean. At a high-level sympos-ium at Princeton University in January 1972,Ballard described how classic geology mapping,observation, and sampling could be done underwater, as he had done with Alvin in the Gulf ofMaine. But when he finished his talk, he wasbluntly asked by Frank Press, then a leadinggeophysicist at the Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology and later president of the NationalAcademy of Sciences, to name one significantpiece of science that had ever come out of usinga submarine. The late Maurice Ewing of(Opposite) The Rift Valley ofthe Mid-Atlantic Ridge.Major breaks (fracture zonesA and B) occur across theaxis of the main rift, causedby complex forces movingthe plates apart. Star warfare alien invasion online. At left,detail of the bathymetry ofthe Project FAMOUS site.(Courtesy of ScientificAmerican 1975)35Scientists studying the photographic track of the projectarea made by the LIBEC (Light BEhind Camera) towed-camera system.

About 5,000 prints were pieced togetherto give scientists an idea of the Rift Valley bathymetry inthe FAMOUS area. (Photo by Emory Kristof, courtesy ofNational Geographic Society, 1975)Columbia's Lament (now Lamont-Doherty)Geological Observatory made especially sure theyoung WHOI scientist, who was still shy hisPh.D., knew his feelings. Wagging a finger inBal lard's face, he threatened to melt down Alvininto titanium paper clips if the expedition didn'tturn out to be worthwhile.In spite of these doubts, Project FAMOUS(French-American Mid-Ocean Undersea Study),as it came to be called, got the official blessingsof its governments on 4 July 1972.

The UnitedStates would use Alvin, and France would employthe bathyscaphe Archimede and the small deep-sea submersible Cyana, Jacques Cousteau'srenamed and refitted SP-3000, which could nowgo down to 11,000 feet.For the American scientists, the pressurewas especially high. The success or failure ofFAMOUS would determine the future of Alvin,which had yet to establish itself as an acceptedtool of oceanographic research.To prepare themselves, the American andFrench scientists underwent exhaustive training,traveling to Hawaii and Iceland to study the typeof volcanic terrain they would likely encounter atthe ridge, where new seafloor erupts from theEarth in fiery lava, and pushes apart the tectonicplates that form the planet's outer surface. Theywere also joined by two new Alvin pilots: JackDonnelly, WHOI's former liaison with the Officeof Naval Research, and Dudley Foster (pp. 17-21),a former Navy fighter pilot.Based on the likelihood of favorableweather submersibles can't be launched orretrieved in stormy seas and the nearness ofland for emergency repairs, the French andAmericans decided they would explore a small,but presumably typical, section of the ridge, lessthan 60 miles square, some 400 miles southwestof the Azores. The area was thoroughly sweptbeforehand by sonars, magnetometers, andseismometers. In addition, thousands ofunderwater photographs were taken from acamera-carrying sled towed by the U.S. Navy'sresearch vessel Mizar.

The pictures were laid outin a giant mosaic on the floor of a Navy gym inWashington, D.C., where the scientists spentdays walking back and forth among them tofamiliarize themselves with what awaited them onthe bottom of the ridge.A Frightening Dive with the FrenchBut in the summer of 1973, Alvin was stilltroubled with problems: sensors weren't workingproperly,a new pumping system continued to actup. Above all, there were questions about thewatertight integrity of the penetrators the littleconical plugs through which wires were threadedinto the hull. Growing antsy waiting on Alvin, theFrench invited Ballard, a member of theAmerican scientific team, to make a dive aboardArchimede. During the dive, a fire broke out,quickly filling the bathyscaphe's passengersphere with thick black smoke. The three mendonned their oxygen masks, but Ballard foundhis wasn't providing any oxygen, so he tried totake it off.

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The French thought he was panicking.They forced the mask back on his face until hewas gasping and choking. In a desperate effort tomake himself understood, he made a knife-cutting gesture across his throat aninternationally recognized signal used by diversto signify they aren't getting air. At last, theFrench pilot turned on Ballard's oxygen.The following summer, the joint French-American project finally began. In June 1974, R/VKnorr, with Alvin aboard, and Alvin's mothership, Lulu, in tow, left Woods Hole for arendezvous with the French in Ponta Delgada onthe island of Sao Miguel in the Azores. Only aday before Ballard had successfully defended histhesis (on the tectonics of the Gulf of Maine),and was now Dr. Ballard.Apart from its officers and crew, Knorrcarried 24 people scientists, graduate students,and technicians.The FAMOUS site was 20 miles long, andranged in width from half a mile to two miles.On the western side was a nearly vertical wall.Down the center ran the rift, hugged by twodeep canyons.

A pair of volcanoes, subsequentlynamed Mount Pluto and Mount Venus, marked36I^^BE. ^^raWOn ^'BmnnB BHHflBHBITension fracture in the Rift Valley as photographed from Alvin.

(Photo courtesy of WHOI)the ends of the canyons. The French dived in theMount Venus area; the Americans exploredaround 700-foot-high Mount Pluto.With only limited resources, the Alvingroup showed its usual ingenuity andresourcefulness. Engineer Cliff Winget made awater sampler with two toilet plungers.

When thedevice was triggered from inside the sub, thesuction cups clapped together, enclosing a water-gathering tube. The device worked extremelywell though its various nicknames couldn't berepeated on prime time. Alvin also carried SkipMarquet's datalogger that let the scientists knowwith more precision than ever before whereAlvin was.The Problem of Playful PorpoisesMarquet's system used transponders, basicallypingers that emitted sound waves. Three weredropped on buoyed lines in the dive area, and allfixes were made from this triangular network.Each pinged in a unique pattern, recognizable bythe navigational gear aboard Lulu. By Alvin'sfourth dive, the system was working so well thatthe sub was landing within 50 feet of the chosenspot. The upshot for geologists was that theyknew precisely where a particular rock camefrom in relation to other samples.Such accuracy took hard work.

Marquet,who had toiled five years to perfect the system,had to plug in the coordinates with a borrowedhand calculator, because the Alvin groupcouldn't afford a computer. Playful porpoiseswere even more of a problem because of theirwonderful miming ability. Somehow they figuredout the unique pattern of pings that made eachtransponder respond. On one dive they 'talked'so much that they managed to exhaust thebatteries of one of the devices.There were other problems. The surfaceteams dredged rocks and towed heat sensors,but one day the dredges were lowered seventimes from Knorr and came back with only tworocks.Because of the earth-birthing processesunder way at the ridge hot lava emerging fromdeep within the Earth-the oceanographers hadexpected to find higher than normal temper-atures on the seafloor. But nobody got anyanomalous readings. There was neither fire norbrimstone at the boundary of creation.

Creepingalong this seam in the Earth was like driving infirst gear through a light snowfall at night. The'snow' was comprised of the millions of tinyparticles the detritus of marine plankton andanimals that are everywhere in the ocean.But there was also grandeur along theridge. The nearly vertical west wall rose athousand feet or so. 'Your eye doesn't believeit,' said Oregon State geologist Tjeer van Andel.Instead of a single break marking the plateboundary, the deep-sea explorers found a morecomplicated topography. Crevasses and faultsbisected and ran parallel to the valley.

Theseafloor had been ripped apart by the forces ofplate tectonics, rather than flowing lava. Thismolten rock hadn't erupted in a singleoutpouring. It oozed out as if squeezed fromhuge toothpaste tubes and hardened into themost bizarre shapes. Some resembled gnarledtree roots, huge peanuts, or sausage links.Others evoked images of swans and elephanttrunks.None of the experienced geologists on37Pillows, Tubes, and Sausage LinksThe lava found at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge took many bizarre shapes, some of which are shown below.Elongate pillow and Alvin's mechanical arm. (Photocourtesy of WHOI)Hollow blister pillow.

(Photo courtesy of WHOI)Toothpaste buddings. (Photo by Robert Ballard, WHOI)Pillow lava with probable sponge.

(Photo by RobertBallard, WHOI)Broken elongate pillow. (Photo courtesy of WHOI)Wrinkled pillow with two sponges and antler-like softcorals. (Photo by Robert Ballard, WHOI)38^.Wjgi:-:.'