Helgoland (underwater laboratory)

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Underwater station "Helgoland" 1970
The underwater laboratory "Helgoland" on the outdoor area of ​​the Nautineum in Stralsund
inside view

The underwater laboratory "Helgoland" is a former German underwater station and the first stationary diving system for saturation diving for use in colder waters.

history

The underwater laboratory (UWL) was built in 1969 by the Dräger company in Lübeck on behalf of the Helgoland Biological Institute . Based on experience from the first use, a wet room was added in 1971 .

In 1972 the station was transferred to the GKSS research center in Geesthacht . From this it was used until 1981 in the Baltic Sea , the North Sea and the North Atlantic . The first station of the mission was in 1969 off Heligoland . During this mission, Karl-Heinz Schumann and the student Winfried Kreytenberg were killed on December 6, 1969 at a depth of 25 meters southeast of the island of Dune while working on the underwater laboratory; they should break the connection between the underwater laboratory and the supply buoy. The laboratory was lifted by the Magnus 4 floating crane in April 1970 and placed on the pier in Helgoland's southern harbor.

Further stations were in 1971 off Eckernförde at a depth of nine meters, in 1973 again off Helgoland at a depth of 23 meters, 1974 in the Bay of Lübeck at a depth of 15 meters, in 1975 off Rockport at a depth of 33 meters and from 1975 to 1981 in the Bay of Lübeck in Water depths between eleven and 15 meters.

In 1998 the GKSS research center presented the UWL to the German Maritime Museum . It was transported by water from Geesthacht to Stralsund , where it has since been exhibited in the Stralsund Nautineum .

Technical specifications

The interior of the UWL Helgoland consisted of a living area of ​​2.5 m in length, an instrumentation and machine room of 6.5 m in length and, from 1973, a wet area of ​​4 m in length. With a diameter of 2.5 m, this ultimately results in a usable area of ​​32.5 m².

In a relatively small space, the UWL contained all the facilities necessary for marine researchers to stay on the sea floor for several weeks. The pressure inside corresponded to the outside pressure; the decompression was performed at the end of the insert.

The underwater laboratory has air conditioning and good thermal insulation. The laboratory was lowered by flooding the ballast tanks with seawater; In order to emerge, the water was pressed out of the tanks using compressed air.

  • Length: 14 meters
  • Width: 7 meters
  • Height: 7 meters
  • Total mass (with ballast): 110 tons

Individual evidence

  1. ^ "Cemetery of the Nameless", the daily newspaper, November 22, 2008, accessed on November 21, 2009 .
  2. ↑ politely: Heligoland: The tragic aftermath: In December 1969, dying two research diver | shz.de. Retrieved February 9, 2019 .
  3. ^ "Underwater laboratory lifted", Hamburger Abendblatt, April 10, 1970, accessed on June 25, 2013 ( Memento of February 21, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 1.7 MB).
  4. ↑ G. Luther: UWL "Helgoland" - an underwater laboratory for rough sea conditions . Ed .: Biological Institute Helgoland. Hamburg 1973, doi : 10.1007 / BF01609498 .

Web links

Commons : UWL Helgoland  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 54 ° 18 ′ 20.3 ″  N , 13 ° 6 ′ 57.5 ″  E