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Gentlemen, have a great dive.

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DSV Alvin, also known as Deep Submergence 
Vehicle 2, is a deep-sea submersible owned

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by the United States Navy and operated by 
the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

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Seal the hatch.

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Carrying two passengers and a pilot on each dive,

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the sub has taken thousands of explorers 
to depths once thought unreachable.

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Every time I get to dive in Alvin, I 
see something I ve never seen before.

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I get to experience that environment 
firsthand, and it s often led to

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big discoveries, not only for my 
research, but other people as well.

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For more than 50 years, the sub has 
traveled to extraordinary places,

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capturing the world s imagination and heartbreak. 
In 1986, it dove on the Titanic, deploying the

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Remotely Operated Vehicle, Jason Jr., and 
returning with striking imagery of the site.

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And following the Deepwater 
Horizon disaster in 2010,

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Alvin aided scientists investigating the 
impacts of the oil spill on deep-sea corals.

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What sets Alvin apart is its 
productivity. It s incredibly

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well supported by the community of 
researchers that use the vehicle

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and the National Science Foundation 
and the Office of Naval Research.

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Of its thousands of dives since 1964, there is one 
often held as the most significant the discovery

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of hydrothermal vents near the Galapagos Islands. 
These alien-like deep-sea communities where

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life thrives without the light of the sun were 
unknown to humankind before Alvin visited them.

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The discovery of vents changed the way 
we think about life. And Alvin was really

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the workhorse that did all that work in 1977.

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If you look at it on a map 
it looks like a blue expanse,

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but down on the bottom it s a different planet.

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Now, Alvin is poised to continue 
its revolutionary scientific work.

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With a new set of upgrades and deeper depth 
rating, the possibilities are endless.

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Alvin will be able to map things 
that we ve never seen before

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that otherwise have not been 
accessible to human discovery.

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How has the research conducted 
with the Alvin submersible

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impacted our understanding of the oceans? And 
what can Alvin s incredible history of discovery,

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inspiration, and daring tell us 
about life on Earth and beyond?