Vintage Film Showing Divers Using Scott Hydro-Pak Scuba

[urmaddad]

[nikeajax]

Gosh and geepers, I say, that's swell! Fine acting too, I see they went to the Gene Autry School of Acting... I wonder if ol' Doris had a headache; musta been gettin' her head smacked pretty good with those twins as loose as the were, couldn't have been very nice on the shoulders either--OUCH! But seriously, that was kinda disconcerting! Very-very cool though, I LOVE that old stuff, thanks for sharing! MMMM, whiskey and diving--YEAH!

Jaybird

[urmaddad]

Doris was quite a cigarette smoking, whiskey drinking, scuba diving babe back then. I wonder what she looks like now?

[nikeajax]

I've heard that some boxers will soak their face in salt water to toughen it up, so if she kept up her liberal dosages of smokin' an' drinkin' methinks a bit like this:

[nikeajax]

Huh, I been thinkin', that guy's braggin' 'bout his Grandfather being a "Profiteer", and only a few short years after they were called "Carpetbaggers", because they didn't need to run a blockade anymore--yeeeeesch! There's no way in H-E-double-hockey-sticks I'd be tellin' anyone 'bout that if that was in my family history!

Jaybird

[urmaddad]

Also, he never finished recovering the gold coins from the captain's strongbox. Why would he give out that information, including the wreck's location? One of his friends might beat him to the wreck.

[SeaRat]

The interesting aspects to me were the use of the Squale mask, Churchill fins, and of course the Scott HydroPac. The Scott HydroPac was said to be the best unit available at the time, but I see with these twin-tank units that it was also not very hydrodynamic in the water. Because of the low valve, and its harness design, the tanks rotated away from the diver, and caused a lot of drag in the water. I've only watched half the movie now, but I'm pretty sure this was made-up concerning the wreck, gold, etc.

John

[nikeajax]

Do we have a date on this one? I showed this to my wife last night and she noticed that the music sounds an awfully-lot like the theme from Sea Hunt: I wonder who was first? She also pointed out that it's a "Wilding Picture Productions" which was supposed to compete with Technicolor in their film processing: this Wilding chap was one of the MANY-MANY people married to Liz Taylor! How many scenes are there where ol' Doris' tanks are floating above her head: could she have been difficult to work with!?!?!?!?!?

Jaybird

[urmaddad]

There is no copyright date on the film, but I am thinking that it was made in the 1960's.

[nikeajax]

Yeah, I didn't think so, but I was hoping you knew something I didn't... I'm gunna say late 1950's as the clothes don't look 1960's to me: they still have that really stodgy full-cut, "Let's use as much fabric as we can 'cause we had to ration it in the war!" drape to the suits. Ol' party-girl Doris' bathing are suits are still modest if you compare them to say, what Annette Funacello--YUM-- was wearing in the early '60s; mind you I ain't sayin' Doris is chopped liver neither...

Me thinks they were taking advantage of the Sea Hunt sound to get he-man kinda guys to want to swill their juice while impressing their little-ladys at how brave they were. Dang, if only there was a car in there, that's always the give-away...

Jaybird

[SeaRat]

The Scott Hydro Pak was discontinued somewhere between 1960 and 1963, when the second edition of Basic Scuba came out. It is still in the second edition, but with this note:

Scott Aviation manufactured and marketed the Hydro-Pak full face SCUBA for both military and commercial activities. It resembled in many ways the well-known Scott Air Pack, so often used by emergency personnel for entering contaminated atmospheres. The unit, once considered the Cadillac of the full face SCUBA, has been discontinued by its makers who have decided to pursue with undivided effort their major field of safety apparatus.

The Hydro-Pak can truly boast many firsts for underwater breathing apparatus and will never be forgotten for the quality unit it was. Here are a few features seen today which stem directly from the Hydro-Pak: the tilt valve regulator concept; cam operated back pack; regulator manual clear feature; combination first stage regulator and constant reserve valve; built-in snorkel; safety harness employing break-away shoulder snaps and quick release aircraft type waist strap buckle; the exhaust regulator for hydrostatic level compensation.

...The manufacturer has advised me that parts for all parts for all forms of the baskc Hydro-Pak, both twin and single cylinder models will be available for some time into the future...

In my last job, we were continuing to use the Scott Air Packs and they still have them.

John

[nikeajax]

John, my wife and I like to watch that old TV show Emergency!, and they use the Scott Air-Pak A LOT! Gosh, every time I see them using them, I automatically default to the Hydro-Pak in my thinking. Huh, I wonder what it would take to convert an Air-Pak to a Hydro-Pak, or, what do they have in common?

Jaybird

[SeaRat]

Jaybird,

There have been several model changes in the Scott Air-Pak. The one from the 1980s that you saw in the Emergency show had a regulator which was waist-mounted on the waist strap, with a hose to the regulator. I actually tested that model in the water for the Winston-Dillard Fire Department in the 1980s, who were setting up a water rescue team then. I advised them that it could be used, but had severe limitations. Two were huge limitations:

--The waist-mounted regulator free flowed in the vertical position; you needed to get the regulator at the same level as the full-face mask's exhaust valve, and that meant almost horizontal in the water.

--The mask, because the visor was curved, showed about 270 degrees of vision, and it was extremely distorted. It almost caused vertigo for me in the water.

The newer models have the regulator at the mask, but still have the curved visor, and so cannot be used underwater.
www.scottsafety.com/en/us/Pages/ProductDetail.aspx?productdetail=Air-Pak+X3+SCBA%2c+2013+Compliant

John

[SeaRat]

Here is a photo of the Scott Air-Paks we used at work. If you'll look closely, you'll see that they are using cartridge respirators, and wearing the Scott Air-Pak. They are actually simulating using the Air-Pak to save air for a real Emergency Response Team response to a spill. The front of these masks are interchangeable from the cartridge to the regulator (which is on a hose to the side of the ERT member.

John

[SeaRat]

Secret Cargo was shot in the summer of 1957. I have confirmed this date as I found in my library a book titled Occupation: Adventure, by none other than Jim Thorne, who was the primary diver in the film. He has a chapter of the book, Chapter Three MEANWHILE, BACK IN THE KEYS, which details his work on the film. It is too long for me to enter here, but I did remember the name of Jim Thorne, and thought I had a book by him. I found it while I am rearranging my bookcase to make room for new endeavors. If you'll recall, there is a scene of Jim shooting a hammerhead shark. Well, here is what he has to say about that.

When you are underwater, you're immersed in a medium that is 900 times denser than air. A quick movement like thrashing can be transmitted through the water almost the same way that sound is transmitted in air. Shark have a kind of built-in radar system, and they are extremely sensitive to that kind of erratic movement. Dick and I were putting the spear through the tail of the fish, so they wouldn't die immediately. They pounded frantically on the bottom. Art McKee joined us underwater, and within a matter of minutes the cameraman came down too.

Suddenly I heard a high-pitched human sound coming from nearby. It was Art. He was making the sound and pointing. I saw it at once: a massive grey shape headed our way. He was a hammerhead, and he must have weighed between 800 and 900 pounds. He found one of the fish and scooped him up, along with about ten pounds of sand. He circled and then came in again. Art gave his warning, but it wasn't necessary. The eyes of every man down there were glued to the shark's every move. The cameraman was right next to me as the great grey beast headed directly for us. I heard the noise of the camera and watched the hammerhead as he kept coming. His big ugly head moved from side to side as he tried to zero in on the smell and the movement of the speared snapper close by. With almost painful clarity I saw the big maw open and close. Still, he came at us--nine feet...eight feet...seven....I felt the cameraman begin to move uneasily. He was now kneeling directly in front of me, so I quickly leaned my legs against his shoulders to let him know I was standing ready. He settled down again. Sex feet...five feet...now I could see the remora (suckerfish) stuck to the white underbelly. Four feet...three...and he turned! I let out my breath and we all looked at each other in questioning relief. But it wasn't over yet. We had enough footage of the shark, but we still had to have a scene of my actually putting a spear in him. I moved over to one of the other speared snapper (a shark's favorite delicacy), and hoped that the hammerhead dat not disappeared for good.

We were in luck! The high-pitched warning sound came again, and I braced myself. Out of the blue mist, he came straight at me. Again his head moved from side to side as he felt the vibrations from the thrashing wounded fish at my feet. The mouth was moving nervously--opening and closing, revealing row of enormous teeth. He stopped for an instant, and I felt I could almost read his mind as he wondered what to do. He came in again, torn between fear of the strange-looking animal standing in front of him and the nervous excitement of wanting the wounded fish. He didn't charge, but kept coming for me at a fairly slow speed. I felt myself get mad. I didn't care any more. I was going to stand there until he either bumped into me or turned. Luckily for me, he turned when he was just a few feet away. I fired, and the heavy spear went into his gill slits. I braced myself for t he shock--but nothing happened. With complete disdain he shrugged the spear loose, and, with a flash of the big caudal fin, he was gone.

I said a prayer of thanks as we headed for the surface.

Thorne, Jim, Occupation: Adventure, The Adventurers Club, London, 1963, pages 40-43.

There is a lot more to the book, including some of the first dives and underwater photography under Antarctic ice.

John