Raising an Undersea Family

Shown here is a photo of our son Eric Milton Chamberland literally departing the land to live for a day undersea. It was the day before he became certified as an aquanaut, living for more than 24 hours in a habitat in Aquatica – the great global ocean. Eric, our other children and their parents found out first hand what it was like to live as a family undersea. Although the habitat was not large enough to accommodate us all, while their parents were doing their research in the ocean, the children were still always connected. In some cases by radio and in others by frequent visits to the habitat bringing mom and dad meals, taking away their trash and just visiting.

It was not an uncommon site to see Claudia sitting in the moonpool tutoring a math problem or giving specific homeschooling instructions. On another occasion, one of the children’s SCUBA instructor sat our son Brett down on the front of the habitat and gave him his final underwater exam – just two feet from where we sat in comfort observing him, having a snack and watching the entire event. It may be the first time parents have enjoyed such a close up and comfortable view of their child being certified as an open water diver – while being in the same element with them!

On their frequent visits to the habitat, their mother Claudia would greet the children at the moonpool and then visit with them. At the end of their visit, she invariably would kiss their salty foreheads goodbye and bid them off with an undersea mom’s loving send off: “Exhale, exhale, exhale…” It’s meaning was unique among mothers on earth. Its meaning was, “Do not hold your breath while returning to the surface, it is dangerous.” While other mothers are warning their children to look both ways before crossing the street, our children’s mother invoked a similar warning, but altogether unique to families who live undersea.

Around our habitat lives a rather hostile looking four foot barracuda. While Fred (the name he was given by the local divers) never seemed to threaten or bite anyone, he was still a rather intimidating stray fish with sporting an absolutely evil looking row of razor sharp teeth. On several occasions Fred would orbit around the habitat and curiously peek inside at us. When they children were around, I would warn them by a hand sigh out the window – with the fingers of both hands together mimicking Fred’s teeth. It at least warned them to look out for Fred, although the worst damage he probably would have induced is causing someone to hurt themselves by trying to get out of his way. But hand signals out the windows to the children were essential when the sound of the voice was strictly confined to the walls of the habitat. Of course there were many other hand signals from ‘shark’ to ‘go back to the surface’ to ‘come inside’ to ‘watch your air pressure’ and ‘you’re getting cold – come inside’.

Families living under the sea will soon become a reality again. While our family may have been the first that we are aware of, and only for a painfully short period of time in 1997 and 1998 - others are sure to follow. And of the Atlantica Expeditions gets its way it will be very soon indeed. But this time, the expedition is never scheduled to end and the trips to the surface will be far less than the trips around the magnificent, crystal void of humankind’s new permanent dwelling place: Atlantica.

Diving With Sharks

When we were in Hawaii recently, a friend shared the details of his relatively recent shark attack. (Please do not reveal his name on replies if you guys know him. He has asked for privacy.) It was totally horrific - he came within inches of death and was hospitalized for over a month. Within an hour of his story we were in the ocean diving with him.

I took my first night dive in the ocean off Honolulu an hour after I saw JAWS for the first time in 1976. I was a younger man then and impulsive and was definitely looking around for the great beasts. But this weekend, diving alongside a man who was seriously attacked, it was a wholly different story. I am not as young as I was and not so much impulsive. The dive in broad daylight was far more intense than the night dive off Waikiki beach. I have been diving in this very spot for hundreds of hours and knew that this was definitely NOT a haven for sharks, but having just heard his story I was definitely looking around.

I know the statistics for shark attacks is lower than being struck by lightning – UNLESS – you live in Florida, that is. And nearly all shark attacks occur in water you can stand up in and most bites are relatively minor leg and ankle bites (ie – surfing injuries). But I also remember the photo that some of my environmental management colleagues took from the air off launch pad 39A. There were countless sharks in the photograph – about one shark every 50 feet or so.

Not all sharks are killers and man-eaters. But all sharks have to eat. They are not known for their intelligence and probably have no idea what a man is, much less swim around and dream up plots against him. But when man encounters shark – it is entirely up to the shark to do whatever he – or they – are going to do.

The shark has very sensitive sensors on its nose. It can detect activity in the water long before it sees its prey and far in advance of the prey seeing the shark. The good news is that sharks apparently do not like the taste of humans. That is why my friend was not killed.

Swimming off the Honolulu Boat Harbor about half a mile out, the shark just ‘tasted’ him and left. In a single instant, the shark clung to his abdomen with its rear teeth. Held him with the back teeth and then took two severing bites with its top teeth in less than half a second. He felt no pain. He thought he had collided with a log. He stood upright in the water and reached his hand out for the ‘log’ and felt the nose of a huge shark. It was at that moment that he saw the ocean around him was ‘purple’. The he felt the huge flap of skin that used to be on his back fold around his arm. The shark turned and left. But he was a half mile out in the ocean bleeding profusely with half his back hanging loose in the water. It was nothing less than a miracle that he survived, and one key part of the miracle is that he apparently didn’t taste very good to the great beast.

As we look forward to longer periods in the water, the site we have selected for the Atlantica I expeditions is also a breeding site for the Bull shark – one of the most aggressive sharks in the world. We will definitely seek more training on diving in those waters from shark experts and diving in and around the habitat will be done with special attention to the activities and behavior characteristics of the rather mean-spirited Bull shark.

Having said all that, we also recognize that our activities are in its waters where it has lived for countless millennia. We are the observers, not the conquerors. We are the scientists there to observe it in its element and we are most definitely not there to remove or injure a single shark. If anything, we wish to study them and count them and understand how the activities of man are encroaching on their habitat. In so doing, we hope to make life easier on them and thereby encourage them to achieve their ultimate balance in the aquatic realm where we have presumed to join them.

PODCAST Tour of the Jules Undersea Habitat

This is a video PODCAST of the Atlantica Expeditions.

A Tour of the Jules Undersea Habitat.

My Beautiful Machine

Last evening I stood inside the New Worlds Explorer habitat, leaned up against the walls and considered this beautiful machine. There is much hype floating about these days on what truly constitutes “cutting edge” technology. But as I stood there and looked through her hatch openings and considered where I was standing, I realized that there was truly more here than just materials. The NWE habitat is a fantastic new design – truly the first of its kind. An undersea habitat with a Kevlar shell. It is a living place under the sea that is specifically designed to study and understand very long term – permanent human habitation of the underwater regions of the earth.

That region is no small place either - while we live crowded and struggling on a mere 59 million square miles of dry land, this new territory of certain promise spreads out before our very eyes and unfolds to encompass an astonishing 138 million cubic miles of habitable space! I am speaking of the oceans – whose human population is now and has always been - zero. And that is precisely what my beautiful machine hopes to solve.

I am very much looking forward to discussing all this in the upcoming Motherboard Television documentary on the Atlantica Expeditions and some of the Expedition Leader’s viewpoints. On November 20th – rain or shine – our undersea team will be conducting that interview on the seafloor in Key Largo, Florida, six fathoms down in the Jules Habitat. I am VERY much looking forward to that event! Anytime I can go back and spend any amount of time dry and warm under the sea is awesome. That is, after all, the only place I really consider as ‘home’ to me.

And speaking of ‘rain or shine’ it is interesting how perceptions of even the most basic and simple ideas change when you move into an alien environment. As I so often remind Claudia when walking or running through the rain – “I am an Aquanaut – so how can a little rain make any difference to me?” As a fine example of that thinking, my very good friend Chris Olstad (who holds the record for most logged time living underwater) was chasing his pet Iguana. It leapt out of his grasp and into a canal. Chris just laughed and leapt in after the animal, thinking, “Fine! You’re in my element now!”

If you are interested in all this, please feel free to check out my book UNDERSEA COLONIES at QuantumEditions.com where this and much more is discussed.

DIY submarine success!

Ralph Buttigieg

Sydney,

NSW Australia

Last year I wrote about Mr Tao Xiangl, a Chinese farmer/inventor who was building himself a submarine from old oil barrels and other recycled material. To my astonishment the submarine has sailed and the brave submariner has survived the experience. Happy submarining Mr Xiangl !

Rusian leader explores Aquatica

Ralph Buttigieg

Sydney, NSW

Australia

Seems the Russians take the exploration of Aquatica very seriously. Valdimir Putin himself has just gone down for a visit:

RUSSIAN Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has dived to the bottom of the world's deepest lake aboard a mini-submarine, in a media stunt unusual even by the standards of the Russian hardman. Mr Putin, wearing special thermal blue overalls, was able to examine the unique flora and fauna of Lake Baikal in Siberia during his four-hour journey underwater aboard the Mir-1 submarine. "I've never experienced anything like it in my life," the prime minister, who served eight years as Russian president, told state television aboard the support ship after resurfacing. "It's a special feeling. What I saw impressed me because with my own eyes I could see how Baikal is, in all its grandeur, in all its greatness," he added. The lake's mythological beauty has always held a special place in the heart of Russians and is its fresh waters are home to a variety of endemic species, most notably the Baikal seal.

"The dive is going perfectly, there is a perfect view with the lights," Mr Putin said from the depths of the lake on a crackling radio link-up during the dive. However he expressed some surprise about how murky the water was in the lake, which contains around a fifth of the world's freshwater reserves. "The water, of course, is clean from an ecological point of view but in fact it's a plankton soup, or so I called it," he said. The Mir-1 is the same mini-submarine that in 2008 set a world record for the deepest dive in a lake by diving to 1680 metres (5512 feet). Russian news agencies said Mr Putin had dived to a depth of around 1400 metres (4600 feet) - the deepest point in the lake's southern part - and safely returned to the surface after four hours underwater.

Perhaps he will follow up his dive with an expedition to thye Russian claimed Arctic Ocean parts of Aquatica.

Cytokine Storms and Swine Flu

As of this moment, there are 100,000 people likely infected with Swine Flu - H1N1 influenza in 48 of the United States. Of those, some 200 have been hospitalized, some needing intensive care treatment. An Assistant Principle of a New York public school died of it this weekend.

“CDC officials say around 100,000 people are likely infected with the new flu strain in the United States and the Director of the Centers for Disease Control said the 5,123 confirmed and probable cases and six deaths in the United States were "the tip of the iceberg.”

Unlike the seasonal flu, we are seeing relatively few cases or hospitalizations in people over 65," the CDC said. Usually flu kills the elderly and people with chronic diseases. When family members are questioned, it seems clear that children and teens are more prone to infection than older adults. "People under 18 are more likely to have infections when another person in the family is infected.”

The reason this is getting so much attention is that this mirrors the effects of the global pandemic of 1917-1918 which killed more than the Black Plague of the 14th century. IN that pandemic, the effect somewhat mirrors what we are seeing with this global outbreak of Swine Flu. One of the key indicators of a severe prognosis is the disproportionate number of young, healthy victims as compared to those who usually succumb to these flu outbreaks. Said the CDC this weekend, “While it appears to be mild, it is affecting a disproportionate number of children, teenagers and young adults.” This is what has everyone worried. In the 1917-1918 pandemic, the exact same scenario played itself out. The 1917 variant was mild but its evolved genetic progeny was a planetary wide killer- mostly of young, healthy people.

The reason for such a result is found in the body’s response to viral and bacterial infections. When the strain is particularly virulent – or able to cause a massive whole body infection very quickly, the body fights back vigorously to survive the onslaught.

The body has a very complex defense mechanism involving many different simultaneous immune responses. One of these responses is called the ‘cytokine’ response.

When the immune system is fighting pathogens, cytokines signal immune cells such as T-cells and macrophages to travel to the site of infection. In addition, cytokines activate those cells, stimulating them to produce more cytokines. Normally, this feedback loop is kept in check by the body. However, in some instances, the reaction becomes uncontrolled, and too many immune cells are activated in a single place. This response is called a “Cytokine Storm”. The precise reason for this is not entirely understood but may be caused by an exaggerated response when the immune system encounters a new and highly pathogenic invader. Cytokine storms have potential to do significant damage to body tissues and organs. If a cytokine storm occurs in the lungs, for example, fluids and immune cells such as macrophages may accumulate and eventually block off the airways, potentially resulting in death.

There is considerable evidence that in the 1917-1918 pandemic where the deaths were concentrated within populations of young, healthy people, of which the Cytokine Storm was a major cause of death. It turns out that being young and healthy is the major contributor to this too-vigorous immune response to a virulent viral organism. In normal flu outbreaks the mortality profile is opposite because the very young and older have immune systems that do not respond with such vigor and the Cytokine Storm is avoided. In these cases, the victims normally die of extended elevated fever and secondary infections such as pneumonia.

The Swine Flu – 1H1N – event was declared over and that it had run its course by the media two weeks ago. But the disease seems to have a mind and a plan of its own. The wise person will keep an eye on the horizon for the dark clouds of a building Cytokine Storm and pray it goes away for real or 2010 may become a nightmare not easily forgotten.

Crying Wolf or Sounding The Alarm?

Before I launch into the eye of the viral tempest with a discussion of Cytokine Storms (to be posted in a day or so), let me preface this with a warning on news stories about this Level 5 state of potential global pandemic. The key word is: potential. The US Centers for Disease Control, the World Health Organization and other nations are all responding in a by-the-book manner to the swine flu, H1N1 potential as a global threat. But the media is now busy with alternate stories on either a full-blown panic or sharp criticism of the response by world governments. The key to all this is simple: ignore the media totally and go directly to the various sites such as the CDC and your local state and county internet outlets. That way, you sidestep typically uneducated media opinions and focus on the scientists and physicians who typically do not speak in a panic mode but in factual terms.

The idea here is that since no one is a prophet, NO ONE knows how this will eventually pan out. The fear is that it will blossom into another 1918 global pandemic with far more terrible results. On the other hand, it may be nothing more than just one of the normal flu bugs which together kill some 36,000 people each year. Today, H1N1 flu is far below even that threat – as of today the number of individuals infected number only 331 in 11 nations and the global death toll as of today stands at 10 – and yet the clear alarm has been sounded. The point is – no matter what opinion you may have, opinions have absolutely no value – it is simply a game of figures and best-guesses.

This issue is dominated by sheer, unemotional statistics. And according to these statistics, if the numbers we see out of Mexico are truly accurate, the statistics favor that this flu is not your ‘standard annual flu’. As we will discuss in the next post, a normal flu virus predominantly kills the very young or old or compromised. However, H1N1 exhibits characteristics that favor a pandemic species - such as statistically targeting young people. Hence the greatest minds in virology and epidemiology have declared a planetary Pandemic Alert of 5, one notch below an actual full blown planetary pandemic. It’s not that H1N1 has done any appreciable damage on a widespread scale – it is that it exhibits the species and statistical characteristics to become very bad. Hence the alarm has been sounded without the associated fatality numbers. It is not that it is dangerous – but that it can be. It is much like sounding the tornado alarm before the funnel cloud is actually spotted and the wisdom of that can be argued – but it is a classic case of taking the most safe and conservative approach to the potential.

It can well be that this threat will go the way of avian flu or SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) and just fizzle out. Or, alternately, avian flu can still become the agent of pandemic - or – it will be still some unknown agent many years from now. Every expert just knows one thing for certain – it will eventually happen and tens of millions will die. The point is – real life is not a movie. There are no scripts. We must not ridicule those who try and warn us with the facts and make us more prepared. And of you really want to know what is going on, book mark this site and this site and stay on target with the real facts minus the emotion and opinions.

Flying Pigs of the Apocalypse

Q: What do you get when you cross a raptor with a razorback?

A: The Flying Pig of the Apocalypse

Very funny – that is until you wake up and find that it’s true and that real people are really dying from such a monstrous creation that is derived from two very real threats to humanity – the avian and swine flu viruses.

You see, viruses are insidiously clever – not that they have a mind to be clever with. They infect host cells of mammalians including humans and survive and multiply by the untold billions by stealing the nuclear materials from the cellular nucleus and making little baby viruses along the way. The theft, of course, kills the host cells in which they start and kicking off a disease that the body either successfully fights off or the whole body dies. In the process, this virus representing most simple of life forms changes its own structure ad hominem so that the body often cannot retaliate in time to meet the shifting form of the viral attacker. This is especially true as the virus is passed from one host to another leading to what we call an epidemic or a global pandemic.

In the current case of Swine Flu, also called H1N1 which is the designator of the viral strain, there are some real questions that the Centers for Disease Control are focusing on even now. Until the flying pigs showed up, the world was waiting for the hammer to drop from the Avian Flu threat – a virus that moves about by an avian/bird host. The swine flu problem, although potentially deadly, was not viewed as such a threat because it typically required the presence of the swine host to be in proximity of the outbreak. Since pigs can’t fly – it did not seem to be nearly the threat as bird hosts who can. It is believed by some experts that the current swine flu virus is a mutated form of both the avian flu and the swine flu, neither of which behave like the current models we are seeing play out - hence the flying pigs of the apocalypse. The problem with 1HN1 is that it is now free of the swine host and is now traveling about freely in and between humans – much less easier to control that even birds.

Every century or so a new strain of flu erupts around the globe and kills millions. The last great pandemic was in 1917-18 when some estimates report that some 50,000,000 people were killed worldwide. This pandemic has been described as "the greatest medical holocaust in history" and may have killed as many people as the Black Death. The epidemiologists have been warning and waiting for the next viral hammer to drop any day now. The frightening part about this current scare is that this may be the one they were waiting for and it is too late to stop it. It is underway and all we can do now is watch and wait.

Pandemics usually come in waves, with the first wave much less dangerous that subsequent waves. For example, the 1918 pandemic was prefaced with the 1917 prequel to the next year’s global pandemic. The mortality rate of the 1917 epidemic was far lower and the effects of this flu were relatively mild in comparison to the mutated version and the horrible global tragedy of the following year.

The reason this history is so important today is what we have already observed in the last week. In the case of the flu’s history in Mexico, it appears to be much more virulent. As of this morning, the mortality rate of the Mexico strain of H1N1 is right a 6%. But in the United States, the mortality rate is still zero – not counting the unfortunate case of the child who died in the US – a Mexican child brought here for treatment. The question that the CDC is struggling with today is comparing the viruses behavior between the Mexican cases and the rest of the world. Why was the mortality rate so high in Mexico while the virus in the USA appears to be far less dangerous? Is this nothing more than the warm-up of a coming global pandemic, just like we observed in 1917-1918? Is this just the pre-stages of the 21st century global holocaust? If it compares to the 1918 pandemic, more than 100,000,000 people could die. That is precisely where there is so much hysteria – it is truly warranted.

Tomorrow we will discuss why the death toll in Mexico is largely among young, healthy people. There is a physiological reason for it – it is called the Cytokine Storm.

Now We Know - The Final Frontier Begins At 73 Miles

If one is venturing to the final frontier, it would be nice to know where it actually begins. Space has a definition – it is that point where the earth’s atmosphere officially ends and the vacuum of space officially begins. In aerodynamic terms, it is that point where there is no longer any lift on aerodynamic structures – such as the wings of aircraft.

NASA has a true need to know where this is for the purposes of piloting the Space Shuttle – and their equations define the boundary layer at 62 miles and the shuttle’s performance is plenty good with this definition.

However, scientists at the University of Calgary applied instrumentation to this question by a rocket launch to this boundary, too high for balloons and too low for satellites. The space boundary instrument was carried by the JOULE-II rocket on Jan. 19, 2007. It traveled to an altitude of about 124 miles (200 kilometers) above sea level and collected data for the five minutes it was moving through the "edge of space."

According to this study, the precise boundary of space is exactly 73 miles above the surface of the earth.

This has a fairly important meaning. NASA defines an ‘astronaut’ as anyone traveling to an altitude of more than 50 vertical miles. For the most part nearly all NASA astronauts fly well above that – but there are some interesting exceptions.

For example: The X-Prize was awarded in 2004 to Scaled Composites as the first private flight into space. But, Spaceship One, according to telemetry, never actually made up what the Calgary definition now defines as 73 miles. Spaceship One only made it to 367,422 feet, nearly three and a half miles short of the boundary. They were significantly above the “astronaut’ definition of 50 miles and just above the space shuttle boundary – but just short of the new definition.

And – there are eight X-15 pilots who have earned “Astronaut Wings” who have flown above 50 miles but still short of 73.

It is, of course, so much trivia and much ado about literally nothing – but – in the future when many millions of dollars are on the line – the precise definition and bragging rights will eventually come into play. This scientist and engineer predicts that the boundary between 50 and 73 miles will be a true no-man’s-territory that no one will want to settle who desire to be called a 'real astronaut'. For after all - who will pay all those hundreds of thousands of dollars and still fly just short of the newly defined boundary? After all - the whole private spaceflight venture is all about and only about bragging rights, period.

PS. If I may be allowed an afterthought – Spaceship Two, is currently designed to carry fairly large numbers of people into that no-man’s-boundary with an advertised max altitude of 68 miles – an agonizing five miles short of the newly defined Calgary limit. I strongly suspect there is going to be an inevitable political argument over this finding!