Richard Branson Single Seat Sub

[Mark Nankivil]

Hi All -

Interesting project - glad to see it coming to fruition:

http://www.foxnews.com/slideshow/scitech/2011/04/06/billionaire-branson-unveils-new-submarine/#slide=1

Enjoy the Day! Mark

 

[cluttonfred]

From one billionaire to another...this appears to be derived from the Deep Flight Challenger project cut short by the death of Steve Fossett.

 

[Johnbr]

It do's look like a mod of the same sub.

 

[quellish]

From one billionaire to another...this appears to be derived from the Deep Flight Challenger project cut short by the death of Steve Fossett.

It's the same sub. Deep Flight Challenger was originally Hawkes' "high end" design for the Deep Flight vehicles. Over time the design was refined quite a bit, and eventually Fossett funded it. After Fossett's death, Chris Welsh bought it from Fossett's estate and has been funding additional work - the Five Dives project is Welsh. The Virgin Oceanic project is a partnership between Welsh and Branson/Virgin that funds the Five Dives project and adds Virgin branding and other resources. Hawkes had previously built a Deep Flight vehicle for use on Branson's private island in the British Virgin Islands.
Beware of the goats on that island, they can be very territorial and enjoy stealing sandals.

It's notable that originally Hawkes wanted to use ceramics developed by NRAD for the pressure hull of Challenger. Since then it's been changed to filament wound carbon fiber.

Hawkes himself is a really interesting, passionate guy who has invented things across multiple disciplines.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_Hawkes