Help for Novel

[Grenouille]

Hello everyone,

I'm French, I've lived in the US for 4 years, and I've been working on a novel with an American for the past 3 years. We've changed some storylines in the past few months, and now need a little bit of help and research on the topic of scuba diving. Basically, I'm coming here to see if I could find someone who would be interested in getting in touch with us by email to answer some questions periodically. We've got nothing to offer, just our eternal gratitude and your name at the end of the book when it finally comes out!

The book wouldn't deal with "classic" scuba diving. It deals with an underwater structure in which people live, and come out of every now and again, wearing specifically-designed, a little "scifiish" diving suits. Basically we're looking for someone who's got experience in diving and relatively precise knowledge about what would happen a mile below the level of the sea in the vicinity of Miami, the physical challenges for the divers, what the suits could consist of and how to make them a little "scifiish" (that is, slightly different from what exists now), the kind of training a rookie would have to go through, how to make a decompression accident happen in the story... things of that nature.

I promise it's nothing tedious, it's quite a bit of fun to discuss if you like stories, but we are asking for a favor nonetheless, so I come to you with lots of humility here! I could ask questions on the board, but not wanting to discuss the details of the plot too much in the open, we'd really like to have someone work with us privately, every now and again when we have questions or need help with figuring out some plot thing related to the diving aspect of it. For us, it'd be incredibly valuable to have that someone to go to.

Sorry for the long post, thanks a lot for your time!

 

[261311]

So wait sorry, is this fiction or non-fiction? It sounds like you're trying to write more of a story than anything too scientific by my interpretation.

I wouldn't get too into any realistic challenges for divers/ residents because it's nigh impossible to my understanding for us to live under water due to decompression, especially if you wanted to travel from the surface to your apartments a mile down. Look at caissons disease and decompression, similar issues would probably be prevalent today even with pressurization. This would need to take more of a sci-fi nature to it with more invented, powerful futuristic life support technologies and maybe an elevator or lift. For an average person to decent a mile, well- they couldn't. It takes extensive training, discipline and skill to indulge in deep diving and I'll let someone else give you the record depth for human decent, but I don't believe it exceeds 1000 feet (1/5 of a mile). Even with our current technology you'd be looking at a mark 10 escape suit which is used for emergency escapes off of submarines at a depth of 600ft or less (people have been deeper but just to give you an idea as per your scifish idea).

I think the most important thing to keep in mind is how unknown the effects are on our bodies at any depth for recreational diving, let alone a serious depth like that. Keep in mind we're not supposed to be down there and the amount of pressure at that level is enormous. You have ~15PSI per 1ATA(Atmosphere, 33 feet), I'll let you determine the rest. A fatal car accident clocks in at around 80 PSI I believe so you'll need redundancies for your environment in case of some sort of hull breach. Humans can "warm up" to PSI and environmental changes but if we get hit with that sort of pressure all at once, it's all over. Not saying you use something as silly sounding as "unobtainium" from Avatar, but you may want to create your own materials for use in building down there if you're describing that.

As per how to make a deco accident occur: aside from descending or living at that depth being one, hull breach would probably just crumple every air space inside into the size of a football.

 

[DevonDiver]

I'd suggest some research into Cousteau's CONSHELF projects...

The old Cousteau books are a treasure trove of exploration, pioneering and learning by accident. It'd be easy to translate them into a more futuristic setting.

Depending on the technicality you want in the novel... take a read of Mark Powell's "Deco for Divers" which will educate you to a believable level on decompression issues and how they occur..

Setting your story "a mile below" the surface would be pretty excessive in terms of depth. Again, to make that even remotely plausable, you'd need a decent grasp of the potential diving gasses (helium, neon etc) and saturation/decompression issues.... Powell's book will assist you in that regard too..

Diving at those depths, the participants would be 'saturated'... living and diving at ambient pressure with their surroundings... like the 'Abyss' movie. Bringing them up to the surface would take a (very) long time though - and that's where decompression illness would occur. Otherwise, they'd be using some sort of 'pressure suit' and moving in and out of an atmosphere below ambient pressure... more like operating in space. If you want 'issues' at the bottom, then look into stuff like 'High Pressure Nervous Syndrome' (HPNS).

 

[Diver0001]

Hello everyone,



Sorry for the long post, thanks a lot for your time!

Have you watched the movie "The Abyss" yet? You'll get some ideas from that. But if your ending involves sympathetic aliens intervening to save the day then nobody who scuba dives is going to want to help you

it sounds like an interesting project but I personally don't know enough about what living at that depth might do to you to really be of much help. I could speculate but it sounds like you want to talk to an expert. What's clear is that it's going to be cold dark and damp at that depth no matter how you slice it. It's also clear that creatures living down that far often use bioluminescence to communicate, navigate and lure prey. That last bit could be interesting if your scientists are looking for some kind of new discovery and encounter bioluminescent creatures that are very large and very hungry LOL. problem is that's been done over and over again in films. Again, check out the film "The Abyss" mostly as a good example of the kind of thing you want to avoid your book turning into...

As for the suit, I think you could get a graphic artist to make some kind of concept based on a "Newt Suit" (google that), which is a diving suit designed for those kinds of depths. Something sleeker, faster and having more dexterity would make it scifiish enough to convince most divers.

As for a decompression accident, that's easy. Any accident that drags the diver up far enough toward the surface is going to cause that. At that depth any ascent to the surface would mean a person would be dead before they even got that far.

Good luck.

R..

 

[FinnMom]

If you writing fiction, you could have the main living quarters of this area normally pressurized. Only the lock areas where people enter from the surrounding sea need to have higher pressures than at the surface (IF you were at depths believeable for scuba, and you aren't). Regardless of whether you have underwater entrances, if you do away with constant exposure to air pressure greater 1 atmosphere in the normal living areas and you eliminate much of the phsiological problems relating to living underwater.

You do need to realize that 1 mile underwater is waaaay beyond scuba depths. Also, how close to Miami is 1 mile deep water found?

Locks for transfer between vessels have been around for some time. That's how bells for saving submariners work.

 

[Grenouille]

Hey guys,

Thank you so much for all your answers, advice and reading info. I will definitely check all that, the books etc. Although I've already seen The Abyss, but it's been a while and I feel like watching it again now, it is indeed pretty relevant.

To clarify, it is definitely fiction, science-fiction to be exact, but we struggle calling it that because we don't want people to think it's a Star Trek or Star Wars kind of science fiction. Nothing crazy (or almost, haha), we like to make it very "real" although we allow ourselves to take inventions into account, things that are maybe not physically possible today. It's set in a near future, and one main character is an inventor, that's the one we count on to solve most of their problems linked to living at that depth. Now I said a mile below the sea, it was a mistake actually, it was an old storyline when the shelter wasn't located near Miami, it could be a very different depth now, so I see from what you guys are saying that we should locate it less deep and make things easier for us.

At this point we were thinking of having them living in a shelter that is pressurized and we didn't think there would be any sort of impact for the people living inside, for we thought the shelter would have been designed so that being inside is exactly like being on the surface. Science fiction yes for sure, but in that context it does sound realistic to me, although I'm no specialist. It's a long term thing, so we really need to avoid having the people inside suffer consequences that would be too harsh to handle.

We also thought the shelter would be equipped with diving suits, very special and designed by that inventor, so that people can go out and do some damage repairs, explore a bit, things of that nature. I guess if we make it less deep, it'll become much easier, like you guys said.

Right now I'm mostly wondering what kind of training a 16-17yo girl would have to do if she wanted to prepare for, say a year later, putting on a suit and going outside. I'd like to make her training a big part of the story, so I'm looking for physically and mentally challenging situations in which to put her, and be realistic so that readers do believe this training is necessary for her to become a safe, successful diver. We have a pond inside the shelter, and lots of space, so any training necessary is probably doable. If you have any ideas about this, please feel free to share.

Alright I need to talk to my buddy about this but I think we can use this thread to ask questions, it would seem to work fine, you guys are all very helpful. I gave him the address of the thread so he might pop by as well and ask some questions. I'll do some reading about all this and be back soon for some more detailed questions. But I already can't thank you all enough. Merci !

---------- Post added April 13th, 2013 at 03:11 PM ----------

I'd also like to add that we need a depth at which it is IMPOSSIBLE for them to get back to the surface with just a suit, they would need to be in a machine to slow down their getting back up, either a sub or some sort of capsule we're trying to have them create. So it's crucial it be deep enough so that if they tried to just swim back up, they'd die from the decompression, regardless of the pace. If anything like that is possible. We need them stuck in there so if all they have to do is just swim to leave, that won't work

 

[Jim Lapenta]

It comes down to how deep do you want it and still be realistic. Once you start getting into the range of say 250 feet you risk serious injury or depth from just ascending. You habitat would have to be pressurized to the depth at which they are actually living or working or close to it as going out in say 500 feet of water (and at which depth unless the suits are atmosphere suits you'll need to adjust the breathing gas and add some other substance like helium as air becomes toxic at just over 200 feet as the partial pressure of O2 increases) and then coming back into an environment the same pressure as the surface is going to have the same results as a trip the surface. They'll need to go into some type of deco chamber/air lock and stay there for a prescirbed period of time. Shoot me a PM with your email. I'll send you something that may help with your training issues.

If you put the depth at say 750 feet it would be deep enough to be way beyond anyone except the most extreme divers, and yet deep enough to be somewhat believable. It woulld also certainly meet your no direct route to the surface without decompression stops.

 

[261311]

I guess a quick run-down of the training you'd need is
-Decompression theory knowledge
-Situational awareness
-Familiarity with gear
-Redundant gear (lights, gauges, masks, regs and tanks), assuming you only have one main character, living at a depth described you'd want redundancies because you don't have anyone there to help you upon gear failure or issues
-Ability to monitor, track and respond to ascent rate changes (through your gear and experience)
-Gas management, to be a safe diver you obviously have to keep breathing
-Ability to troubleshoot any issue solo

I believe for that depth though decompression would take days, if not weeks to slowly decompress safely. That's why I'm just assuming a pressurized environment to help combat the pressure differences between surface and depth. I think that way you might be able to essentially, simulate decompression stops at depth in some sort of compression chamber, maybe while changing out of your gear and unwinding?

 

[Grenouille]

There are many characters in the book, but only a few that use the suits to get out. The idea is for one experienced one to train that girl who wants to do it. I was under the impression that by using those suits, they didn't need to take weeks or even hours for any sort of decompression, they put on the suits in that room like you mentioned, activate something, go in the water through an airlock, come back, take off the suit, get back to their lives. Is it possible? At least to stay at the depth they're in, because they're not trying to get back up, just to stay near the shelter to fix things, or go explore plane wrecks on the ground to find equipment.

I'm reading about scuba training right now, but I'm having trouble seeing what really is connected to diving from a boat, "up there," and slowly going down, and what on the other hand wouldn't apply to the characters in the story, who are already at the bottom when they get out. Would their learning and technique be different? Like if I'm talking about buoyancy, does that matter at all times or is it mostly crucial to move up and down? (To be clear, they don't swim in a horizontal position, they stand on the sand and walk, we want to represent this very close to astronauts on the Moon, if possible)

Also, I'm kind of disappointed to read that although one would better be healthy and active to dive, it is not necessary to be in super amazing shape. Any excuse I could have to create the need that she does train physically, either in or out of the water, in order to be ready? I'm not talking knowledge here, but pure physical strength or stamina.

 

[Diver0001]

Also, I'm kind of disappointed to read that although one would better be healthy and active to dive, it is not necessary to be in super amazing shape. Any excuse I could have to create the need that she does train physically, either in or out of the water, in order to be ready? I'm not talking knowledge here, but pure physical strength or stamina.

Personal motivation. She psychologically views the environment she lives in as dangerous and feels a strong internal need to be "ready for anything". Also, this not necessarily logical sense of urgency she feels to prepare for some kind of disaster gives you lots of openings to flesh her out psychologically.

R..

---------- Post added April 14th, 2013 at 03:19 AM ----------

There are many characters in the book, but only a few that use the suits to get out. The idea is for one experienced one to train that girl who wants to do it. I was under the impression that by using those suits, they didn't need to take weeks or even hours for any sort of decompression, they put on the suits in that room like you mentioned, activate something, go in the water through an airlock, come back, take off the suit, get back to their lives. Is it possible? At least to stay at the depth they're in, because they're not trying to get back up, just to stay near the shelter to fix things, or go explore plane wrecks on the ground to find equipment.

Something about this makes me think you could find some ideas in Arthur C Clarke's "Sands of Mars". the "sifi-ness" of it might be a bit dated but something about the way he creates an ambiance might be useful. Have you read that?

R..