Triton Submarines Founder Patrick Lahey and the Giant Squid

Sometimes, just a small segment of an interview can conjure up vivid photos in your brain of what is happening and how it is so powerful for the person having the experience.

That is just what happens in this Episode Two of the Great American Senior Show as your grey-haired host Sam Yates continues his one-on-one conversation with Triton Submarines Founder Patrick Lahey. 

The image is that of a giant blue eye. The size of a basketball. Only, this "Ole Blue Eyes" is deep beneath the ocean and is of a mystical giant squid. The encounter brought tears of joy to a researcher who had studied the elusive giant squid his entire life.

Only now, he was eye to eye with something huge that he only dreamed about seeing in his lifetime.

Join us in this special edition of the Great American Senior Show as we continue our conversation with Patrick Lahey, Founder, Triton Submarines, from Triton's World Headquarters in Fellsmere, Florida. 

Transcript

Sam Yates: 0:13

Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of The Great American Senior Show. I'm your grey haired host, Sam Yates, and I am back at the World Headquarters international headquarters for Triton submarines. Patrick Lahey, co founder back with us on the show again, fascinating topic, submarines. And I want to say welcome back.

Patrick Lahey: 0:36

Thank you very much. It's great to be here again with you, Sam.

Sam Yates: 0:39

You know, in our previous episode, we did talk about the models and touched briefly on the cost. I think I found one online, one of your earlier Tritons for 1.5 million, and it included a surface ship, I brought it to my wife's attention. And she said, stick to the center console. But I know that there are people like me, who are looking to have an adventure. And you're going to make that possible by some of what is happening within the cruise industry. We touched on it a little bit in our previous episode. But how will that work?

Patrick Lahey: 1:12

Well, what's happening is there are there's a sort of small segment, if you will, of the cruise ship industry, that's what they call expedition focused. So these are typically smaller cruise ships that cater to a more affluent clientele. And they're typically guests who want to go to places that you might not otherwise visit. So rather than just sort of running through the Caribbean, somewhere, they might go to somewhere like Antarctica, or Galapagos or you know, Tahiti, or some, some places that are maybe off the beaten track, if you will. And as a ship that's focused on Expedition cruising and adventure and trying to provide their guests with memorable experiences. There's some of them who've embraced this idea of having a submersible onboard, because they've got lots of terrestrial based and shore based activities that they can do. But they like the idea that they could augment their existing agenda to include trips underwater. And many of these places where the ships go have incredible rain life, lots of beautiful stuff to see underwater. And, you know, let's face it, there's a lot in the ocean that has been explored. And so I think one of the things that is captivating to the guests on these ships, is that when you get in a submersible, and you go down hundreds or 1000s of feet, you're quite literally seeing a part of our world that no one's ever seen before. And that's compelling.

Sam Yates: 2:47

Has it changed you? Yeah, absolutely.

Patrick Lahey: 2:49

There's no question that submersibles from the very first time that I dived in a sub and I remember my first dive as though were yesterday, have dramatically changed the course of my life. In fact, I became so fixated on submersibles, human occupied vehicles, that I've devoted my entire professional career to working with them and building them and teaching other peoples how to operate them and enjoy them. Well, I

Sam Yates: 3:18

know you've been told before, but nice job. It's not a bad job. You know, when I was walking through the shop coming in here, I am looking at some of the the vehicles in progress. And for our audience, these are not your typical of what you would imagine a submarine a cylindrical tube with no visibility. These are actually quite nice leather seats and light, give us a give us a description of what's in a typical

Patrick Lahey: 3:50

washer. So first of all, it's probably worthwhile to make a distinction between a submersible and a submarine. So submarines, you know, you think of, as you say, military craft. They're designed to go extraordinary distances. Not that deep, but they can go fast. They typically have weapons platforms, they don't have windows, there's no way to see out in a military submarine. By contrast, a submersible is really a vertical probe. It's a craft designed to explore a limited area and to do so in a way that is you know, it's focused on viewing a submersibles a visual tool, but the main distinction is a submersible is powered by a finite amount of energy. That's usually stored in batteries, and you can't regenerate that power. Unlike a nuclear power plant or diesel engine that recharges your batteries. Typically, submersibles have this stored amount of energy that allows them to explore for a while and they've got to come back to the surface, be recovered to the ship and then recharge the main feature of the subs that you see it hotshot is this transparent pressure boundary. This completely clear envelopes that you sit inside of that protects you from the pressures of the ocean, but allows you to have a completely unobstructed view of your environment. And it really does make for a profoundly immersive experience.

Sam Yates: 5:22

Are we on the verge of underwater deep sea tourism?

Patrick Lahey: 5:26

Well, I think there have been tourist submarines around now for quite a while. And for anybody who's traveled through the Caribbean or out to Hawaii, or even to Guam, think there's one in Japan, there's even one I think in, in Latin Israel, there are tourists submarines that have been out there, these are more like a military submarine that there's a tube and then there's windows that you can see out of the difference in the vehicles that we're building is that we focus on having completely transparent pressure boundaries, so that you don't feel as though there's anything between you and the environment. And and I do think we are at an exciting moment in in our history. And I think a lot of it has to do with technology, the evolution of technology. That's, that's things like batteries, but also materials technology, our ability to thermally form acrylic, into these big, thick cylinders, that allow us to take people more of them deeper, all of these changes that are happening, have made it possible for us to produce a craft that can be used safely, repeatedly, to even really extreme depths. And so yeah, I do think you're going to start to see more and more people embracing the idea of owning a sub. I'd like to make them more affordable. But unfortunately, they are expensive to produce. And right now our clientele are typically people that have a lot of that have the financial wherewithal to be able to afford them. Yeah,

Sam Yates: 6:59

maybe an odd question. But with that scenario of what you are making happen, are you considered the leading experts in your field?

Patrick Lahey: 7:10

Well, certainly, I would like to think we are one of the leading if not the leading experts in our field, we have competitors. Naturally, you know, if you were to ask me, I'd say, well, the stuff that Triton builds is the best. But I genuinely believe that's true. I think our track record speaks for itself. We've we've not only built the most deep diving subs, we've also built the very deepest diving sub, in fact, the only fully accredited sub that can take people to the deepest part of our ocean, which is 6.9 Miles underwater, 36,000 feet,

Sam Yates: 7:43

hence the name the 36,002. That's right, 36,000. And,

Patrick Lahey: 7:48

you know, that was a big moment for for us. But it was also a big moment for the subsea industry, because I think that it's not a reach to suggest that that craft has fundamentally changed our relationship with the deep ocean, by giving us access to it for the first time in history. Prior to the development of that sub, only two subs had dived to the bottom of the ocean, and they only made a single dive. The sub that we built is designed to make repeated dives, daily dives to any depth and to be able to do it safely and reliably. And that I think is what has encouraged so many more people to get in it and make a dive in it. You don't you know, the the the fact that it's accredited, and that it has gone through this arduous certification process is really what separates it from the things that preceded it.

Sam Yates: 8:41

Does our navy or our governmental officials come to you for advice? Or say, Patrick? This is what we're experiencing, based on your experience? And based on where you been? And you don't have to answer if it's if it's something you can't answer, but I would see you as a a significant resource for everyone.

Patrick Lahey: 9:00

Well, that would be great if it were the case, but it's not you know, they don't come to us for advice. We've we've not really done any work for the military. And while you would have thought that building the first and only fully accredited sub that can dive to any depth in the ocean would have been caused for, you know, jubilation, people jumping up and down. It seems to have had rather muted response. And I think this is actually one of the things that we have to work towards changing because the ocean has always taken a backseat to space exploration. For some reason. People seem to be really enamored by space exploration, but not so much about ocean exploration. And, you know, when you think about it, the ocean is pretty important to us. It controls our climate, that's two thirds of the oxygen that we breathe comes through. Most of the biomass on Earth is found in the ocean. And to me, it's the most viewed Beautiful, most incredible place on our planet. I'd love to see us devoting more time, energy and resources towards exploring the ocean not just because I build subs, but because I happen to just love the ocean.

Sam Yates: 10:14

Well, if any of our retired or semi retired or soon to be retiring military admirals, whoever, if they're listening right now, we would invite you to come and visit Triton subs because you'll be absolutely blown away by what you see and what you discover discovery though, pause for a moment back up into discovery, what is a few, if not the most significant thing that you have discovered in your journey beneath the sea that perhaps you didn't expect? Or it was one of those aha moments?

Patrick Lahey: 10:47

Well, I've been lucky enough in my career, which now spans almost 40 years in the underwater business to have had some rather fantastic experiences. And and so to have our customers, you know, our subs have been used to create some of the most fascinating documentaries that have ever been made. The filming of the giant squid was done in a tritone sub in 2011. We filmed a giant squid from about 680 meters or about 2000 feet to over 3000 feet for 22 minutes in High Definition prior to that, no one had ever seen that animal in its natural environment. So it was a big moment for us. And I think it was a big moment for the people who are on that expedition. And just to give you a sense of how impactful that was to the people who were in the sub, the gentleman who was responsible for the method or the method for filming the giant squid, this guy, Dr. Cooper, Dara, he put he sort of used a squid on a lewer, if you will, and you know, the squid came in and you know, the turned on the lights. And he sitting there looking at this animal that he studied for his entire adult life. And the moment was so powerfully emotional that he wept is a man who devoted his life to studying this animal. And when he came face to face with it, he was so overwhelmed by seeing it alive and moving with that big blue eyes the size of a basketball looking looking at them that it just, you know. Yeah, it over. He was overcome by the emotion of the moment. So we did that we did a deep sea. We did a documentary on deep sea sharks, the Blue Planet series, they were filmed in Triton subs. Of course, we prosecuted an expedition called the Five deeps expedition where we dive to the deepest point each of the five oceans after building that craft for victory scopo so yeah, we have had a pretty extraordinary run. But you know, we're not stopping there. We're not resting on our laurels. We've got a lot of other exciting new projects ahead. And you know, as long as I'm still breathing, I'm gonna continue pushing the envelope and challenging conventional thinking and together with my wonderful team here at Trident submarines, looking to see what else we can we can accomplish.

Sam Yates: 13:16

Your website for anyone interested in more about Triton submarines is

Patrick Lahey: 13:21

its Triton subs.com. That's T ri, t o n. S. ubs.com.

Sam Yates: 13:28

Great. Patrick, I want to thank you very much for allowing me the time to spend with you today. Here at the world headquarters of Triton subs. It's been a fascinating conversation and I want to leave the door open for a return at some point, if that's okay with you.

Patrick Lahey: 13:44

That would be wonderful. Sam, it's been a pleasure to speak with you. Thank you and your audience for having enough interest to want to come here and visit Triton and see the the wonderful machines that we produce here. I consider trading to be like a skunk works for the ocean. And I look forward to giving you a tour and showing you some of the cool products that we have in development right now.

Sam Yates: 14:05

I've actually been to the old skunk works from my aviation correspondent days and what you're doing here. You're right on target. This is the Skunk Works of the ocean. Congratulations.

Patrick Lahey: 14:17

Thank you very much.

Sam Yates: 14:19

All right, everyone. I'm Sam Yates, your gray haired host of The Great American Senior Show. And that's the way our program happens.