Bathyscaphe Trieste
The Trieste was a constructed by Auguste Piccard bathyscaphe, a submarine that was built specifically for the deep-sea research. Initial plans for this underwater vehicle developed Piccard in 1952, it was made in Italy and launched on August 26, 1953. This vehicle was initially designed ( 6,096 meters =) for depths up to 20,000 feet.
Already on September 30, 1953 led the Trieste Ponza in the Tyrrhenian Sea at a record dive through. Auguste Piccard and his son Jacques Piccard came here in their diving equipment prior to a depth of 3,150 meters. This record was surpassed by 1954, however, the French Bathyscaphen FNRS - 3, which is 4,050 m deep appeared off the coast of Senegal.
In 1958, the boat was taken over by the U.S. Navy and was involved in several searches for lost ships and submarines, including the search for the lost nuclear submarine USS Thresher. In 1958 the vehicle was converted to be suitable for dives to greater depths.
The actual bathysphere ( the pressure hull ball ) was prepared by the company Krupp engineering in food. She had now dives to a maximum of 36,000 feet ( ≈ 11,000 m). A safety feature was composed of a number of steel balls part of the ballast, which was held by the electromagnet. In case of failure of the power supply the balls broke immediately and the boat appeared automatically on. As buoyancy served around 85 m³ gasoline in a cylindrical sheet tank.
On January 23, 1960, the Trieste was the first U- boat in the Mariana Trench with a depth of around 10,910 m, the Challenger Deep, one of the deepest parts of the ocean, reached and then reappeared. At this depth, a pressure of over 1000 bar prevails. The deepest point in the Pacific and throughout the world's oceans is the so-called Witjastief 1, located some 1850 km east of the Philippines 11 ° 19 '0 "N, 142 ° 15' 0 " O11.316666666667142.25Koordinaten: 11 ° 19 '0 "N, 142 ° 15 ' 0" E in the southwestern part of the Mariana Trench and is only about 112 m deeper than the depth reached at the time of Trieste
The crew maneuvered the Trieste to only 4 m above the sea floor, which probably served as a safe distance; the 10,910 m water depth ( depending on the source and a depth of 10,916 m is called ) is the until now unbeaten record dive of a submarine. After the dive trip this Meerestief received the designation Triestetief. Inmates were the Swiss Jacques Piccard and Don Walsh of Americans.
In various reference books a depth of over 11,000 meters is wrongly specified. The difference is due to the incorrect calibration of the depth meter, which was carried out in fresh water.
After the decommissioning of the boat, the pressure element was processed and fitted to the successor Trieste II. The Trieste is today in the United States Navy Museum in Washington, DC issued. A faulty testing cast of the pressure hull was saved in the 1960s in the Krupp factory in Essen from the scrapyard. The interior was rebuilt with some original parts in order to best fit the model. The cut model is now in the shipping department of the Deutsches Museum in Munich.