Here in Santa Cruz, our water is considered chilly by many. Right now it’s 58° F (15°C). Most surfers have to wear wetsuits and booties to stay warm. Some people, however, do jump into the glorious waves with just their bathing suits. In fact, some inspirational people like Peggy Miles, a local teacher at the Santa Cruz Adult School, start their mornings with a dip in the water in just a bathing suit and swim cap. She’s actually been starting each day with a 20-30 minute swim in the ocean for about 29 years and says a day just isn’t right without a swim in the water.
Sadly, Peggy couldn’t take a leisurely swim in the water in Antarctica with only a bathing suit and a swim cap. Though she wouldn’t freeze to death, she’d die of hypothermia. She could partake in the “Polar Plunge”, like I’d like to, which involves jumping in for a few seconds with a crew of people ready to pull you back out. She could also get trained and get the equipment needed to SCUBA dive in Antarctica and thereby help us do our research!
What do you think a SCUBA divers needs in order to survive an hour-long dive in 28.58° F (–1.9°C) water?
How can they make themselves comfortable and safe in the water so that they can collect specimen and take pictures?
What did Willy Heinrich and Verne Peckham have and what did they wear to stay warm 100 years ago?
Underwater research, by way of SCUBA diving, in extreme environments like Antarctica actually requires not only special equipment, but also lots of diver training, special operational procedures, and consideration of diver physiology.
Let’s start with a few tidbits about the special equipment.
The first divers wore wetsuits with woolen underwear and canvas mittens. They had brass diving helmets like the Siebe diving helmet pictured below, which Willy Heinrich, our first Antarctic diver, wore in 1902. The first divers did not use tanks of any type and instead were supplied by a compressor on the surface. They also didn’t have buoyancy compensators (BCs) which are vests which allow them to control how much they float or sink underwater
Would you want this diving helmet from 1902 on your head? Picture from Vintage Gallery.
60 years later, diving was more comforatable. Peckham had a heated dive shack and used a Bel-Aqua/Aquala dry suit with attached gloves and Duckfeet fins. For warmth he wore a neoprene wetsuit, wool mittens, and a wool sweater. Tanks were invented in 1961 and, thus, Peckham and a two-hose Aqualung regulator and a single Aqualung tank with a pipe fitting.
Does this diving outfit from 1961 look comfortable enough to go under the ice with? (Picture from Scripps Institution of Oceanography Technical Report 2003)
When our ICE AGED Paul first went SCUBA diving in 1954 or 1955 in the Gulf of California, he actually had an old homemade scuba rig. He used an old air force B -29 regulator and the hardware store pipes.
Paul is an engineer and a scientist! He made his own diving gear!
He actually says, “Life was good back then and it was especially good that I did not kill myself.” (Paul, we’re more than happy that you didn’t kill yourself and we hope you still think life is good.)
Life is good considering the equipment and knowledge we now have.
What equipment do you know of that we have that makes life safer and more comfortable underwater?
For one, we have technology. Computers show divers their current depth, their maximum depth, their elapsed time, and the time remaining at their depth without needed a decompression stop on the way back. Some also show remaining air time though they are not necessarily trustworthy. Some also show temperature but they are not made to use in such cold water so they are not very accurate for divers in Antarctica.
One interesting note is that divers in Antarctica cannot use one new invention: BCDs or BCs (Buoyancy Control Devices or Buoyancy Compensators). BCs are vests which allow divers to carefully control their descent or ascent in the water and they are a required piece of safety gear elsewhere. However, divers cannot use them in Antarctica as they could place the diver in danger. In Antarctica, divers dive under a blanket of ice and have only one "escape" hole; they don't have open ocean above them which would let them surface wherever they need to. If they get into trouble while wearing BCs in Antarctica, the inflated BC could potentially cause them to "surface" right under the ice instead of at the hole. If they surface right under the ice, it would be impossible to see their "escape" hole because of the angle of view; the poor diver might never find a way out. There is also a thick layer of brash ice (ice wreckage or fragments of ice) trapped under the solid ice and a diver can completely disappear into it without a trace. If a diver is in trouble in the water in Antarctica, it is actually better to be on the bottom where the others can see them and help them.
A last piece of equipment that divers have nowadays is drysuits. Drysuits keep a diver much warmer than the early wetsuits. Wetsuits use a layer of water to insulate the person but drysuits use a layer of air, which is much easier to warm and which, consequently, leaves the diver much warmer. Divers in Antarctica, and actually dry suit divers everywhere, also use dry suits instead of BCs to to control their buoyancy. By adding air or taking air out of their dry suit they can make themselves sink or float depending on if they want to go down or up. The air also helps the diver avoid buises from the suit and the equipment being squeezed against them from the pressure of the water.
With all the luxuries that we have now, would you want to jump in and see the wonders that the world offers us under the ice in Antarctica?
Peggy, are you ready to SCUBA dive in Antarctica with all of that?
Just equipment is not enough though. Divers also need special diving training. While our divers don’t need the deep water diving and cold-water diving certificates that sport divers need, our divers do have SCUBA certification and AAUS certification (scientific certification through an accredited research institution). They also have experience with dry suits and with diving.
Lastly, there is the consideration of diver physiology. Divers in Antarctica (and all over) cannot simply get dressed, grab their gear and buddies, and jump in the water and dive for as long or as deep as they want. Divers have to carefully monitor their air levels so they don’t run out on the way back up to the surface. They have to plan ahead as if they do work underwater or if they start to stress or panic, then they’ll use their precious air more quickly and they might not have enough to get back to the surface.
They can also only go so deep before the pressure of the heavy water above them changes the oxygen and nitrogen levels in their blood. In fact, our limit is 130 feet and the divers can only be down there for 5 minutes. Some divers, like Paul, will have no problems with this. Others, like Stacy, have to develop coping strategies as she starts to get anxious due to the increased nitrogen in her blood. Without coping strategies, she might go down too far or stay down too long, and, yes, like the movies show, she might be tempted to give her regulator to the sponges.
The divers cannot also simply whiz back up to the surface without thinking, or breathing. At a depth of about 130 feet, the weight of the water above a diver is huge. This weight creates pressure in the air in their lungs. The air in their lungs at that depth actually has about five times the pressure as the air that they normally feel on land. If they took that pressurized air back up the surface, it would expand to 5 times the volume, rupturing their lungs. This is easy to overcome by them simply not holding their breath. Breathe and it'll be ok!
In addition to breathing, divers have to think and stop periodically. The divers have to be aware of a potentially horrible condition called the bends. The pressure of the weight of the water above a diver causes the nitrogen from the air in the lungs to get dissolved in the water of the diver’s body. It is not necessarily dangerous to have the nitrogen in one's body or to go down so deep, but it is dangerous if the divers don’t carefully monitor their ascent and go up slowly (about 30 feet per second) and do a safety stop at 15 feet for about 3-5 minutes. By stopping, the divers let the gas come out of their bodies slowly. If they were to not stop, then the gas would form bubbles, which can block blood vessels or nerves and cause significant injuries if not death.
Luckily for us, we are taking with us a group of intelligent divers, some of whom have lots and lots of experience. Though many have had hundreds if not thousands of dives, they, as Stacy states, “… are all far prouder of the fact that we can dive in the softest, finest sediment environments and perfectly control our buoyancy to never touch the bottom - and keep the visibility pristine and the animals undisturbed. This is also an ethic we can all get behind more than just building up number of dives.”
For more details on diving, see Jennifer’s journal of her first time diving in Antarctica .Otherwise, stay tuned for upcoming stories from Julie, a newbie to SCUBA diving in Antarctica, and Bob, an experienced Antarctic diver.
And having read this, are you ready to start learning to SCUBA dive so that one day you could head down to Antarctica and do underwater research?
Would you rather jump in our now-not-so cold water and play around a bit on the surface?
Or do you aspire to be like Peggy and start each morning with a swim in the ocean?