Article from Popular Science, April 2003, pages 87- 89

FIRST PERSON:
Underwater Airplane Takes Flight
By Mark Schrope

Graham Hawkes is the world's first waviator. His goal: reinvigorate manned ocean exploration.

The sea lion is taunting us. Having matched our speed through several banks and dives, it cocks its head, looks me straight in the eye, and fires off a short burst of bubbles as if to say, "Is that all you got?" At this, Graham Hawkes, the inventor and pilot of this submersible, just smiles. "I'm sure that was the first time a human has kept pace with him," he later tells me.
Hawkes's newest submersible, Deep Flight Aviator, is all about firsts - the first research submersible to reach 10mph, the first underwater craft to function more like a fighter jet than a dirigible. And if all goes according to plan, the first such vehicle to cover vast swaths of ocean in a single dive, and enable scientists to catch glimpses of hitherto unobserved creatures like the giant squid. Today's flight in Monterey Bay, California, is its first in open water.

Though Hawkes began his career designing submersibles for military, commercial and scientific use, he left
conventional ocean engineering out of frustration with its lack of imagination, especially with regard to manned exploration. 'In any other field, you're always pushing, always striving for the moon," he says. 'This business lacks that vision."

As evidence, Hawkes points to the act that most deep-diving submersibles are decades old, including the famous Alvin that probed the Titanic. Sure, they've been improved and upgraded over the years, but they'd still lose a race to a walking human, which limits them to focused research instead of expansive surveys. Some scientists go so far as to say that manned submersibles are outmoded now that remotely operated and autonomous underwater vehicles are on the scene. But not Hawkes. He contends that keeping humans in the mix offers distinct advantages, not the least of which is placing the most powerful scientific tool known to man, the human brain, on location.

To reinvigorate manned ocean exploration, Hawkes built an underwater airplane. That he's the first to do so baffles him-- air and water are both considered liquid after all, so the engineering overlap should be a no-brainer.

He hit upon the idea while designing a submersible called Deep Flight I to probe the 36,000 foot Challenger Deep in the Marianas Trench. The (raft proved the concept of underwater flight, but by no means did it push the Iimits. That's Aviator's job.

The craft's lightweight composite frame minimizes drag. Rather than move up and down by controlling ballast, as conventional submersibles do, it uses wings attached upside down so the craft will dive-Bernoulli's principle in reverse. Once you get to 5 mph, the downward force created by the wings counterbalances the vehicle's positive buoyancy, allowing it to fly level. Moving tile gray grip style joy stick, which is linked to ailerons on the wings, makes the craft climb, bank, or dive. A throttle controls speed, and foot pedals turn the tail rudder left or right. A toggle on the tip of the joystick reverses one of the two side mounted thrusters for even sharper turns. Trying to master such an assernblage of controls ---similar in configuration to a U.S. Air Force A 10 tank-buster--makes my situation not unlike that of a typical flight student.

Life support is self contained within each of the two pressurized passenger pools. The key, says Hawkes, is to regularly check the green LED beside my right leg to make sure enough oxygen is being pumped in to replace what my body uses. If the 02 dips too low, I simply turn the dial over my left shoulder to increase the flow. A scrubber system soaks up the carbon dioxide.

The physics of the pods, which are designed to accommodate a reclining human, limit the craft's maximum depth to 1,500 feet-not as deep as a more pressure-resistant spherical pod, but more than enough to take operators beyond light's reach. The vehicle is also designed to launch from any boat, ship or beach, and can be driven or dragged to dive sites. Today's launch site is Monterey Bay's famous Fisherman's Wharf, and after taxiing to its end, we dip below the surface. The scene immediately goes from chaotic to calm, with only the passing of jellyfish to indicate that we're actually moving forward. All that breaks the silence is the gentle whir of the life-support system, a slight sewing-machine hum from the thrusters, and our occasional communications through handheld VHF radios (a through-water communication system will be tested on future flights).

Gauges outside my pod, though not operational on our flight, will indicate depth and compass heading. Between them is a mechanical pendulum that accomplishes the same task as an airplane's artificial horizon, employing gravity to measure dive angle and banking degree. Behind me is a switch that will, should the craft malfunction, inflate the Aviator's three emergency floats.

After a few dips and dives, Hawkes hands over the controls and asks me to fly a straight line. I overcompensate at first-making it feel as if we've hit turbulent water-but I pass the test and get the go-ahead to try a more advanced maneuver: a breach. I yank back on the joystick, launching us toward the surface at a near-vertical angle. The front six feet of the Aviator punch through the surface; Hawkes is completely out of the water. "One hell of a breach," he shouts through his radio.

A bit too steep, perhaps, but who's to say? The whole point of today's flight is to gauge what the Aviator can do. We stay fairly close to the wharf for the rest of our 75-minute flight, never diving below 40 feet, but nevertheless push the craft through several more turns that strain our five-point harnesses. We stop short of barrel rolls and other such hydrobatics, though-Hawkes isn't sure how the batteries, which are designed for electric cars, will function upside down. In the end, he deems the Aviator's first open-water flight a success.

In the near term, Hawkes and his team plan to use the Aviator in tourist-oriented flight schools, the first of which was scheduled to open in February in the Bahamas. For $15,000 rookie pilots will get two days of underwater training including a two-hour dive into the Tongue of the Deep, a 5,000-foot canyon sporting, on its outer rim, the world's third-largest reef. Here, they can pursue animals, search for shipwrecks, perform hydrobatics, and explore never-seen sections of ocean.

But Hawkes is most excited about the scientific possibilities, such as being the first to glimpse a living adult giant squid. The timing and location of this mission aren't set, but the plan is to fly deep, shut down, and glide to the surface with only the sounds of breathing and the occasional steering maneuver to break his cover. Night vision and low-light cameras, which he plans to install this summer, should help.

"Exploration is regarded as something that belongs in the last century," says Hawkes. "In the deep sea, that's patent nonsense."

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Are you interested in learning how to fly underwater? Learn more about our Deep Flight Underwater Flight School.