Omega 36 I South AfricA DEluxE I ShoppIng & lIfestylE watches I 37 MASTERS OF THE SEA “The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever.” – Jacques Yves Cousteau There is nothing as exciting as a good mystery and they abound The friends contemplated the design of various vessels that might within the depths of the Big Blue. Lying within the hearts and allow divers to journey past this depth without being crushed to death. minds of the many men and women who have intrepidly explored Beebe consulted various engineers, but it was his fortuitous meeting our oceans over the centuries is the knowledge that, with more with Otis Barton, who presented him with the blueprint of a simple than 95 percent of the underwater world still unexplored, their deep-sea diving vessel called the bathysphere, that resulted in curiosity may never be satiated. a collaborative, record-breaking dive and opened the door for exploration at even greater depths. It was in 1932 that Omega presented the Marine - the world’s first In June 1930, Beebe, Barton and 26 assistants floated out on a barge wristwatch designed specifically for divers. In 1948, the company to a dive spot 10 miles off Nonsuch, a tiny island off the coast of launched the legendary Seamaster range, which coincided with Bermuda. The bathysphere was connected to the barge with a 3 500- Omega’s 100th anniversary. The first watches were loosely based on foot steel cable, almost an inch thick. For the explorers inside the the waterproof wristwatches made for the British military at the end bathysphere, the only connection to the outside world was through of World War II, and were equipped with self-winding movements in telephone wires and the electricity cables for the lights which ran both standard and chronometer versions. The chronometer version within a solid rubber hose. The team performed a number of dives, was universally appreciated for its robustness, accuracy and reliability. each one progressively deeper than the last. On August 15 1934, With what can be considered two lines in one, the ‘Professional’ and Beebe and Barton made their record-breaking descent of 3 028 feet ‘Dress’ ranges of the Seamaster line have, for over half a century, (about 939 metres), withstanding 1 360 pounds (over 616 kilograms) complemented each other and ensured the Seamaster's place on the of pressure. This record dive stood unbroken for 15 years. wrists of some of the world’s most famous royalty, divers, treasure Beebe took the Omega Marine to a depth of 14 metres as early as 1936, hunters and even a spy or two. citing the watch’s resistance to such an environment as ‘veritable progress in the science of watchmaking’. It marked a decisive turning point for the line, which has been associated with robust divers' Exploring Great Depths watches ever since. For Beebe it was never about breaking records or making history; he From the dawn of modern-day ocean exploration, Omega watches was driven by the opportunity to discover creatures which had never have graced the wrists of many of the world’s greatest adventurers, been seen before and he took great delight in naming them. He likened including William Beebe, Yves Le Prieur and Jacques Cousteau. his sub-sea journeys to ‘a world as strange as that of Mars’ and noted William Beebe, the marine biologist and explorer, was a leading pioneer the feelings of ‘complete and utter loneliness and isolation … more in the oceanic world. The discoveries and revelations, which he shared akin to a first venture upon the moon orV enus’. in many books about his numerous expeditions, allowed readers Commander Yves Paul Gaston Le Prieur, an officer of the French greater insight into the natural world. Beebe was fascinated with the Navy and the inventor of the ‘self-contained underwater breathing possibilities of deep-sea diving and had many discussions about it apparatus’ (Scuba) also favoured the Omega Marine watch. In 1925, with his friend and fellow naturalist, Theodore Roosevelt. They shared Le Prieur attended the Industrial and Technical Exhibition in Paris and the same concerns about water pressure and the effects it could have witnessed a demonstration by a diver using Maurice Fernez’s breathing hotos: © shutterstock hotos: on an unprotected diver at depths of just 200 feet (about 60 metres). apparatus; a simple T-shaped rubber mouthpiece connected on one P 38 I South Afric A DEluxE I ShoppIng & lIfestylE watches I 39 side to a long tube which had air pumped into it from the surface and floor exploration and a number of underwater cameras. on the other to a simple rubber ‘duck’s bill’ valve, which allowed excess During World War II, Cousteau served as a gunnery officer in France and exhaled air to escape. The diver’s nose was pinched by a pair of and was later a member of the French Resistance, receiving the Legion spring clamps to stop water coming in and his eyes were protected by of Honour for his espionage work. His underwater filmmaking began small goggles with rubber surrounds. during the war and he helped to found the French Navy’s Undersea Used to using traditional diving apparatus, Le Prieur was impressed Research Group in 1945. In addition, he was involved in oceanographic by the simplicity of the Fernez equipment, particularly the freedom it research at a centre in Marseille. After the war he continued working allowed the diver. Le Prieur was already a keen inventor with patents for the French Navy, heading the Undersea Research Group at Toulon. to his name, including the plane-mounted Le Prieur rocket launcher Cousteau founded many marketing, manufacturing, engineering and a number of designs for mechanical lead computing sights for and research organisations in order to expand his work in marine both ship-to-ship and anti-aircraft guns. It is therefore not surprising exploration. In 1950 he converted a British minesweeper into an that he quickly saw a way to make Fernez’s equipment more mobile oceanographic research ship named the Calypso, aboard which he by replacing the tube to the surface pump with Michelin cylinders and his crew carried out numerous expeditions. containing three litres of air compressed to 150kg/cm2 as the air His book Le Monde du Silence (The Silent World, 1952), which he supply. Le Prieur approached Fernez with his idea and the latter co-authored with Frédéric Dumas, popularised oceanographic agreed to modify his equipment to fit Le Prieur’s plan, resulting in the research and scuba diving. It was adapted into a documentary film first open-circuit scuba system. two years later and won both the Palme d’Or at the 1956 Cannes On the 6th of August 1926, the ‘Fernez-Le Prieur’ diving apparatus was International Film Festival and an Academy Award in 1957. He became demonstrated publicly in the swimming pool of Tourelles in Paris. The director of the Oceanographic Museum of Monaco in 1957, a role unit, a cylinder of compressed air carried on the diver’s back with two he held for 30 years. Cousteau led the Conshelf Saturation Dive gauges, one for tank pressure and one for output pressure, supplied Programme, conducting experiments in which men live and work for air continually to the mouthpiece and was ejected through a short extended periods of time at considerable depths along the continental exhaust pipe fitted with a valve as in the Fernez design.T his was the shelves. The undersea laboratories were called Conshelf I, II and III. first time that a man could breathe underwater with no connection to During its ‘Precontinent II’ experiments in the Red Sea in the summer the surface at all. of 1963, Jacques-Yves Cousteau’s team used the Seamaster 300 to In 1933 in order to allow divers to travel further below the surface prove that divers could live in a submerged, saturated gas environment without being affected by ‘mask squeeze’ brought on by the increasing for long periods without adverse effects. water pressure below the ten-metre mark, Le Prieur replaced Fernez’s The ever-increasing depths at which divers were working led to goggles, nose-clip and valve with a full face mask, which was directly the creation of the famous ‘Ploprof’ (PLOngeur PROFessional or supplied from the air cylinder, balancing the pressure in the mask with ‘professional diver’ in English) Seamaster 600, which was launched the external water pressure. Le Prieur was granted a patent - number to the public in 1970 after four years of intensive research and testing. FR768083 - for his scuba system in 1934. This watch proved to be more than equal to the new challenges faced Jacques Cousteau graduated from the French naval academy in by professional divers. Cousteau and his divers used Ploprof watches 1933 and was commissioned as a second lieutenant. He was intent off the coast of Marseille during a set of experiments to test the effects on becoming a navy pilot however a near-fatal car accident during his on divers working at depths up to 500 metres. pilot training ended his aviation career. In 1974 he formed the Cousteau Society, a non-profit environmental It was in 1936, near the port of Toulon, while swimming underwater group dedicated to marine conservation. In acknowledgement with goggles that Cousteau’s eyes and heart were first opened to of his efforts the United Nations awarded him the International the majesty of the ocean. While not formally trained as a scientist, Environmental Prize in 1977. In 1981, the Fondation Cousteau (later his love of the ocean and diving led to a life of undersea exploration, Equipe Cousteau) was established in France and it was from these two conservation and invention.