When the former Chairman of The Historical Diving Society, John Bevan, died in 2020 he bequeathed his collection of artefacts that was on display at the Shipwreck Treasure Museum in Charlestown to The Diving Museum.
Amongst those items was an historic observation chamber.
Charles Isbell, an experienced commercial diver, had the observation bell built in Los Angeles in 1951 for inspecting deep-water sewer lines off the coast of California. (Above: Charles Isbell standing beside his observation bell, c. 1951).
In December 1963 Divcon, an oilfield diving company, rented the bell from Isbell to reduce the number of inspection dives on a contract with Shell that required working to 370 feet, the first time commercial divers had worked at that depth.
(Above: The bell on it’s side at the wharf a Santa Barbara, California).
A year later, Divcon used the bell for the Libyan Atlantic oil company off the coast of Libya, where two divers, Walt Thompson and Murray Black, worked at 525 feet, to this day the deepest working dives ever made in standard dress (heavy gear).
(Above: The bell in use offshore Libya)
By 1966, Isbell’s observation chamber, which Divcon had subsequently bought, had seen 15 years of hard use. For the previous two years, first in Libya and then in the North Sea, Divcon had rented it to the oil companies for $1,800 a month, during which time it had been dropped onto a steel deck from a height of 20 feet and twice slammed against the side of a vessel. In short, it had had a long, active life and was by that time ‘worn out’. When the firm that x-rayed the welds telephoned to say that the chamber would withstand no more than 100 feet of pressure, Black had it planted in concrete in front of the company’s Great Yarmouth office.
Several years later an over-zealous member of the Divcon sales force wanted to dig the chamber out again and send it on a job. Tom Earls, the operations manager, put paid to the idea by showing him the x-rays.
It was later acquired by John Bevan and loaned to the museum at Charlestown.
The bell was cemented into the ground and surrounded by decking and so it was always going to be difficult to remove. However, now that the Shipwreck Treasure Museum has closed, the bell has been recovered for the Diving Museum collection. Our current Chairman, Mike O’Meara made the trip to Cornwall on the 9th May to assist and record the recovery of the chamber.
Our thanks go to Gordon who owns GM Lifting, a specialist crane operator from Wickham who kindly facilitated the recovery of the One Atmosphere Observation Chamber. As well as providing the transport to bring the chamber back to Gosport, he arranged for Macsalvors to provide a crane and crew to lift the chamber onto the transport at Charlestown.
It was a complex lifting operation with a number of unknowns. We calculated the weight of the chamber with its concrete stabilising pads to be 2 tons. In the event it proved to be 1.9 tons – not a bad calculation and a few sighs of relief all round!
The bell was then lifted onto the bed of the lorry and driven back to GM’s yard in Portchester, Hampshire where it will be stored until we have prepared a base for it among the external collection at The Diving Museum.
Our thanks to everyone who was involved in recovery and we look forward to seeing the chamber on display outside the museum next year.
The observation chamber in situ at the Shipwreck Treasure Museum in Charlestown, Cornwall
Attaching the strops in preparation for lifting the chamber
Taking the strain
Lifting the chamber and concrete base
Lowering the chamber onto the back of the flat bed lorry
The chamber securely tied down onto the lorry ready to start the journey back to Portchester.
En route for Hampshire and, eventually, The Diving Museum
The work that is being carried out at No. 2 Battery is funded by:
The Arts Council England
Historic England
Gosport Borough Council
Hampshire County Council
and
The Heritage Fund
