Crossing the Atlantic in a pedal-powered submarine

Having accidentally invented a prototypical blade that — thrown into a swimming pool — essentially swam by itself, machinist/inventor Ted Ciamillo crated the Lunocet, a carbon-fibre tale for divers that doubles the record swimming speed of even the Olympic swimming champion for ordinary paddlers. But he's not stopping there. Rather than just inventing the blade, Ciamillo is using is to power a pedal-powered miniature submarine, and he plans to paddle it across the Atlantic later this year.

It's a wet sub, which means that Ciamillo will need to use a wet suit, snorkel and scuba diving gear, since the interior of the sub will be flooded with water. And experts are skeptical that he'll make it even halfway, short of being a nigh-invulnerable superman.

But his submarine does have one very cool perk: it has the lowest disruptive impact on the thirty foot surface of the ocean than any submarine yet.... a surface which scientists know surprisingly little about. Marine biologists are pumped, hoping that Ciamillo will discover many heretofore unknown species that might otherwise be scared away by churning blades or slashing rudders. And wonderfully enough, they specifically cite the strange species of the giant cephalopod.

Across the ocean in a pedal-powered submarine [New Scientist]

Discussion

Take a look at this

#1 posted by mappo , February 5, 2009 10:53 AM

Columbian drug lords, rejoice!

#2 posted by Takuan , February 5, 2009 11:35 AM

I look forward to meeting him.

#3 posted by ridl

, February 5, 2009 11:50 AM

I look forward to finding out more about this propeller.

#4 posted by muteboy , February 5, 2009 12:04 PM

I look forward to the wreckage washing up with foot-wide sucker marks on it.

Then him turning up a month later, with amnesia and a strange smell of ammonia about him. Then neighbourhood pets would start going missing.

#5 posted by The Lizardman

, February 5, 2009 12:09 PM

I'd love to see him make it but I might love images of of a giant cephalopod engulfing that thing even more.

#6 posted by dculberson , February 5, 2009 12:24 PM

Giant Squid, meet source of Giant Indigestion!

Seriously, carbon fiber seems like it would be tremendously bad for even the hardiest of digestive tracts.

#7 posted by dculberson , February 5, 2009 12:36 PM

Whoops, should have read the article first; it's mostly stainless steel, titanium, and PVC foam.

#8 posted by RedShirt77 , February 5, 2009 1:10 PM

"Seriously, carbon fiber seems like it would be tremendously bad for even the hardiest of digestive tracts."

So if a shark eats him the shark would get colon cancer?

#9 posted by Jenonymous , February 5, 2009 1:44 PM

Okay, Grammar Nazi time:

He invented a TAIL. Not a TALE. He didn't sit around telling stories to divers, he invented a TAIL for them. You know, like the thing that's on the ass end of a fish?

Srsly get a copy editor.

#10 posted by dculberson , February 5, 2009 2:56 PM

RedShirt, I'm thinking more along the lines of bleeding out gastrointestinally over the course of a couple of days. The chewy center would still be gone, of course.

#11 posted by pork musket , February 5, 2009 3:15 PM

@9 It's a bloody blog, not The Economist. And you'd be bored if they had a copy editor, admit it.

#12 posted by dculberson , February 5, 2009 9:24 PM

Shit, this isn't the Economist?

Well, there goes my excuse for reading it at work.

#13 posted by strider_mt2k

, February 6, 2009 4:41 AM

I look forward to the road ahead.

To do otherwise would be unsafe.

#14 posted by ZippySpincycle , February 6, 2009 5:59 AM

"...short of being a nigh-invulnerable superman."

I see what you did there. Spoon!