SeaOrbiter is a synthesis of all of the vessels and mobile underwater homes that Jacques Rougerie has designed and built. The concept is characterized by innovating new technologies and the creative genius of its designer, which result in an unheard boldness of live marine environment observation.

In 1992, Richard Presley (USA) spent 69 days and 19 min in La Chalupa research laboratory, an underwater module built by famous undersea pioneer Ian Koblick and set at a lagoon in Key Largo, Florida. The test was carried out as part of a mission entitled Project Atlantis which had as its aim to explore the human factors of living in an undersea. On that occasion Jacques Rougerie and his friend Jean-Loup Chrétien, at that time still a NASA astronaut, came to visit along with Russian cosmonaut Vladimir Titov.

Launched in 1982, this trimaran allows 12-18 people to observe the underwater fauna and flora continuously from an observation deck below the waterline. Still in use around the Netherlands Antilles, Aquaspace pioneered a new concept in marine biology studies from the surface.

This semi-submersible trimaran designed for underwater leisure observation operates on a variable buoyancy principle, which delivers exceptional underwater views through its large panoramic portholes. A series of 25 Aquascopes were built and some are still sailing today.

The first underwater house built by Jacques Rougerie was launched and immersed in 1977. The unique feature of this habitat-laboratory is that it can be moored at any depth between 9m and 60m, which gives it the capability of phased integration in the marine environment.

It’s onboard Trieste, a bathyscaphe developed by his father Auguste Piccard, that Jacques Piccard carried out, on January 23, 1960, along with capt. Don Walsh, an officer in the US Navy, a dive down to 10 916 m at the heart of the Mariana trench in the western Pacific, setting the world record for the deepest dive in history. This record, which still has not been beaten, was a decisive step in exploring our oceans and whose impact was planetary.

Jacques-Yves Cousteau introduced us to the Silent World through the prism of television, which gave him an audience and international acclaim. In this way the Merien community swelled as the Calypso pursued its adventures in all the oceans of the world.

His novel “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea” was undoubtedly the first catalyst for a community known as the Meriens, mustered symbolically behind the Nautilus.

The original idea and design of SeaOrbiter are created by the world-renowned French architect Jacques Rougerie. SeaOrbiter continues the legacy of Jules Verne, Jacques Piccard and Jacques-Yves Cousteau, exceptional visionaries who have influenced Jacques Rougerie in his 35 years of research.

The first Frenchman and the first European in space, Jean-Loup Chrétien has three space flights on his name. The long-time friend of Jacques Rougerie has been notably instrumental in getting the space agencies, particularly NASA, on board with the SeaOrbiter project, initiating the link between space and the ocean which is now at the heart of the SeaOrbiter program.

This underwater habitat was launched in 1981 to act as a scientific base suspended in midwater, using the same method as Galathée. Hippocampe can accommodate 2 people on saturation dives up to a depth of 12m.

Launched for the first time in March 1978, this underwater shelter suspended in midwater (between 0 and 60 meters) is a mini scientific observatory 2.8 meters high by 2.5 meters in diameter. The Aquabulle can accommodate 3 people for a period of several hours and acts as an underwater refuge. A series of Aquabulles were later built and some are still being used by laboratories.

In 1973, Jacques Rougerie imagined a submerged village where men can live beneath the sea. The village was designed to accommodate aquanauts and astronauts. Its biomimetic architecture was later adapted to the study and management of sub-aquatic resources.

Son of the famous Auguste Piccard who pioneered the stratospheric balloon, Jacques Piccard was one of the greatest explorers of the ocean abysses of the 20th century. Piccard together with Jacques Rougerie would go on to develop the idea of a drifting vessel which culminated in the birth of SeaOrbiter.

The father of modern diving, Jacques-Yves Cousteau was on one the three famous “Mousquemers” (musketeers of the sea). Together they popularized diving and opened up the underwater world to the wide public, Cousteau in particular taking the route to cinema and television. He was the first to install houses on the seabed, inspiring Jacques Rougerie in his creations.

Jules Verne’s vision on how technology could allow people to move freely in the undersea world had a powerful influence on Jacques Rougerie, who adopted the maxim of this great writer:

“Anything one man can imagine, other men are capable of realizing”