Aquanaut Awe

An “underview effect” takes hold on extended seafloor stays

- Susan Cosier

MARK PATTERSON WAS LIVING underwater for a week inside the Hydrolab, a white, cylindrical research station at the bottom of the ocean in the eastern Caribbean.

It was 1984, and he was on his first of what would become many missions involving saturation diving: descending to the seafloor and spending multiple days there, leaving the lab during the day to explore the underwater world as an aquanaut. After acclimating to the depths, he couldn’t ascend even if he wanted to. To avoid dire health consequences, he would have to spend 24 hours for every 100 feet of depth slowly decompressing when the mission ended.