New Depth Record Today on Inspiration 224m

[pwfletcher]

Triple world record attempt in deep diving with a closed circuit rebreather
(CCR).

Chris Ullmann (Germany), Manfred Führmann (Germany) und Volker Clausen
(Germany) plan on the 21.08.2003 in Safaga/Egypt to simultaneously dive to a depth of 222 metres (727 feet). This depth has never before been reached using a rebreather.

For the attempt, they will all be using the "Inspiration", a CCR (Closed
Circuit Rebreather) manufactured by Ambient Pressure Diving in England. To provide backup, various diving cylinders with differing gas mixes will be utilised
and safety divers will be positioned in depths up to 100 metres.

Plan: On the day prior to the record attempt, safety lines, an oxygen-filled
habitat und various other pieces of equipment will be installed in the Red Sea
near the coast of Safaga. On the 21.08.2003 the three divers plan to descend from a boat at exactly the same time to a depth of 222 metres (727 feet).

The descent will take approximately twelve to fifteen minutes and the ascent,
in order to complete the necessary decompression, around six hours. For the
long decompression, in addition to staged stops, the habitat (an underwater
tent) will be utilized. In the habitat the divers will be able to stand in
waist-deep water with their upper bodies in the gas bubble contained by the habitat.

They will continue to breath, however, from their rebreathers.
Documentation: The dive will be substantiated through photos, video filming, as well as appropriate depth recording equipment such as the VR3 dive computer and specially prepared and calibrated instruments able to record the exact depth. Furthermore there is interest from a German TV company who wish to send a camera team on location to document the attempt.

www.Thetreble2dive.com

 

[5615mike]

very cool having the tent environment for deco.
How did it go?

 

[jepuskar]

Not sure yet, they are still in deco......

 

[GlockDiver]

Looks like they did it:

http://www.divernet.com/news/stories/record220803.shtml

 

[JuPit]

Just read a report on a german website -
seems that all three of them were facing massive problems including complete failure of the inspiration´s electronics because of the depth.

The report (in german) plus some pictures:
www.orca-red-sea.com

 

[caveseeker7]

All three rigs had problems. First one, on descent was Führmann's, at about 210m. His instruments (electronics) quit for a while, but he continued anyway. As the camera man he had to record the whole thing. He managed to get his electronics back, it doesn't say how.

Second was Clausen's Inspiration, which quit on ascend at about 220m. Not good. He switched to his bailout gases and then on to his partner's tanks, till he got to the safety divers at 90m. they got him a new Inspiration within 3 minutes on which he finished the dive.

Ulmann's rig went kaputt on ascend around 50m, where he switched to bailout tanks for a few minutes until he too got a new box. They do apperently have excellent service in Egypt.

Ulmann and Führmann spend 4 hrs. in the UW habitat, Clausen 5 hrs. for safety. At least they enjoyed some sausages while decompressing. As I said, excellent service.

Total times were 7 and 8 hrs., respectively.
Their max depth was 223.7metres, and they agreed that Inspirations shouldn't go past 180m.

Now Padiscubapro, go and see if the Hammerhead is any better than those mass market Inspirations.

 

[madmole]

Congratulations to them all.

Bog standard Yellow boxes too!!!! apart from larger wings. Wonder how they got the scrubber to last so long

I'd love to see those VR3 downloads, especially the PO2 levels throughout the dive

But bugger me!, if my electronics stopped at 5m I'd bail, let alone 210m. As the handsets have a gas connection to the scrubber and hence the contents should be at ambient there should be no problems until the ambient pressure is higher than the Tank pressure plus the interstage

Wonder what could cause the glitches? Must ask Kev how deep he pressure tested the Hammerhead controllers to

 

[caveseeker7]

madmole once bubbled...
Bog standard Yellow boxes too!!!! apart from larger wings. Wonder how they got the scrubber to last so long

I was wondering about that, too. If they just "fell" down to depth rather than swim, and then ascended on a line there was probably not much excersion. That might given them some extra time. Or the boxes weren't standard after all. Chris Ullmann is the guy behind Deep bandits, they made a custom rig named Deep bandit One. Build around a steel frame kinda like Enrique's (not as solid though), it had a 35% larger scrubber. 3,8 kg, maybe they used those in Egypt. Finally, they did spend quite some time inside the habitat. Three and four hours, respectively, according to the write-up on the Orca site. So they might have used the RBs only for four hours. The pics on the site don't show them using the rigs inside the habitat, and certainly not while having the Bratwurst. Still, pretty amazing considering the depth.

madmole once bubbled...
Wonder what could cause the glitches? Must ask Kev how deep he pressure tested the Hammerhead controllers to

So do I, and probably everyone with an Inspiration. Actually, I'd like to know what exactly happend with the instruments, how Führmann managed to get his back, and what caused it.

I'm curious how deep Kevin did test the Hammerhead. Thought I could send Joe to try it out , but he ought to be busy playing in the Caymans at ZeroG. Hope his Infinito got there on time to be taken along, so we get some intresting posts out of his trip. And there was a post or two about something called Predator???

 

[KentCe]

Is this really a record? I would assume one would need to make the entire dive on the CCR.

 

[caveseeker7]

I've been torn about that, too. As far as the rigs go, not much to brag about since all three had failures, two of them entirely.
As for the divers, I still believe diving for records sake is nonsense. Kudos for trying, and thanks of the Inspiration community for testing the limits. Congratulations (that's how I read Madmole's, anyway) for surviving it.
But I'm having trouble with the record thing considering that A) all units failed, two so babdly that OC bailout and spare-rigs needed to be used and B) happy hour in the habitat was planned from the get go, it was never a CCR only dive.
Also remember, it's the Inspiration record, not the RB depth record.