TO get this week's color-picture story about submersibles (see SCIENCE), the TIME team followed trails that led through Louisiana swamps, experimental labs, shipyards and under the surface of two oceans and the Gulf of Mexico. Among the special equipment they used, the most important item was an underwater camera designed by Marine Explorer Jacques Yves Cousteau, now made by Nikon and sold under the name Nikonos. It is the first camera sealed to function under water without special waterproof housing.
Using this camera, George Leavens, one of the free-lance photographers on the story,...