James Bond had one. Every billionaire with a yacht aspires to one these days. And now you can join an elite corps of people who can take the plunge into the ocean depths in a personal submarine.
They’re becoming must-have accessories for a growing fleet of exploration cruise ships and they’ve come a long way from the damp and cramped military and scientific submersibles that were the only way to go deep just a few years ago.
Today’s subs are made of exotic materials and feature luxuriously upholstered seats and they can be as sleek as the sexiest red sports car. They were the hit of a recent Seatrade Cruise Global conference, where representatives from civilian submarine makers were announcing their latest toys for going in-depth on an expedition cruise. Here’s a look at what it’s like:
It’s hardly what you imagine a submarine would look like: the Super Yacht Sub 3 from Dutch submersible maker U-Boat Worx looks more like a big bubble that provides unobstructed views of the ocean. The wraparound composite Plexiglas dome is so clear it’s hard to fathom that it’s almost a foot thick. But it has to be to withstand undersea pressures of up to 10 times what we feel on the surface. It’s certainly a great stride forward from research subs that used to have windows no bigger than portholes. Some other models in U-Boat Works line even look like sports cars.
Already attractions on Crystal Cruises’ expedition yacht Crystal Esprit and the Chinese cruise ship Genting Dream, subs like it are coming on other expedition ships including Scenic Eclipse and Crystal Endeavor.
Scenic’s submarine, named Scenic Neptune, can do as many as eight dives a day. The first sailing of Scenic Eclipse will be August 15, 2019 – an Iceland & Atlantic Canada sailing from Reykjavik to Quebec, followed by sailings down the eastern seaboard of North America.
Erik Hasselman a pilot and commercial director for U-Boat Worx, explains that like scuba diving, the secret to its agility underwater is the amount of air in floatation tanks. Emptying the tanks lets the sub descend and levelling off requires adding small spritzes of compressed air to let the sub hover at any depth. Refilling the tanks with air will bring the sub comfortably to the surface again.
There are no worries about decompression on the way back up because the interior is pressurized. The boat-like hull will also let the submersible float on the surface, for wildlife expeditions along coastlines, he adds.
To go on a dive, Crystal doesn’t launch the submersibles from the ship, so you’ll take Zodiac ride to where the sub is floating. A second boat is on the surface to monitor the dive and communicate with the pilot.
You don’t even need to get your feet wet as you climb aboard. Down a hatch on a series of steps to the upholstered seats. The pilot sits in a higher perch in the middle with the controls. The lithium-ion battery powered cruise sub hovers silently amid a school of fish or at the edge of a shipwreck as guests sip Champagne.
The controls are very similar to the joy sticks and thumb controls you’ll find on video games and while the subs are run by trained captains, guests can get a chance to try the controls.
U-Boat Worx, that’s been in business for a decade, has developed models that can accommodate from one to 11 people and operate to depths of from 300 feet to a mile beneath the surface. For research, the company has a sub line called C-Researcher that the company says has been tested to 13,123 feet (more than two miles).
Thanks to pressure-tolerant lithium-ion batteries, the new submarines take half as long to travel from the surface to the ocean floor, and researchers are able to spend longer under the water than before. They’re also able to use more lights, and run more powerful attachments, which should make it possible to conduct missions in the deepest, darkest corners of the ocean.
Like flying airplanes, submarines require a pilot with training and experience and deck hands trained in launching and maintaining the high-tech equipment. That and price tags that start at $2-million mean that a ride on them is a bit of a splurge. Currently the price on Crystal Esprit for an hour-long dive expedition is $595 a person.
Still, the experience comes with bragging rights like few other explorations on Earth. Expect to see more of them on cruise ships in the future.
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