4 ms·

I admired the sheer audacity of this ship. I hope there is a replacement in the works.

jnsaff2 3y ago
If they can't find $8M to extend this ones life for 10 years then I highly doubt they are going to get a new one. Unfortunately.
- Cthulhu_ 3y ago
  Given how much money is thrown around by rich people, I find it so hard to believe that $8M for something like this is nowhere to be found.
  - hgomersall 3y ago
    The free market in action! As everyone knows, if nobody is willing to pay, then nobody values it.
    - blamazon 3y ago
      More like the free market inaction.
  - Ekaros 3y ago
    I think there are probably dozens of things like this(not exactly but random things) that could use also millions. Like that observatory. And there is only so much willingness to spend money.
  - gedy 3y ago
    or maybe California or the federal government's budget?
  - kjs3 3y ago
    Doesn't generate enough clicks.
- OldGuyInTheClub 3y ago
  A sad commentary no doubt. But, it is always tough to get donors to cough up sustainment funds. The glamor is in the new. Might be easier to get more if the naming rights are offered up. Newer isn't always better but one can hope the same foresight and build quality can be brought to a future design.
- phire 3y ago
  I suspect there is very little justification for a manned platform anymore. It requires are crew of five (not including the up-to 11 scientists). Much of the science would probably be better off without noise introduced by crew and the generators. Scientists might be better off with an unmanned battery powered platform. Or unmanned ROVs. And if you do need a manned platform, the deep sea oil industry now operates hundreds of them. It might be cheaper for scientists to simply piggy-back on those.
  - Certified 3y ago
    >And if you do need a manned platform, the deep sea oil industry now operates hundreds of them. It might be cheaper for scientists to simply piggy-back on those. Not that much cheaper. At least in the US based oil companies I have worked with, the cost of sending even one person to an offshore platform can easily exceed 20k USD. Everyone on the platform has to have extensive safety training. Only a few training facilities are setup to do things like Helicopter Underwater Escape Training [1] so the cost is pretty high. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHTk3JNtMlw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHTk3JNtMlw
    - zirgs 3y ago
      20k sounds like peanuts compared to the cost of maintaining their own platform.
- gregoriol 3y ago
  Is it only about money or could it also be about its usefulness? I have no information on this, but like when Arecibo collapsed, there were discussions about how much it would cost to fix it and how useful it could be. Maybe it has made a lot of research, and some new research directions would better make use of another kind of tool?
- yreg 3y ago
  It apparently cost 600k to build[0] (6M in 2023 USD), much less than I would expect. [0] https://scripps.ucsd.edu/ships/flip/history https://scripps.ucsd.edu/ships/flip/history
  - spoonjim 3y ago
    It would cost $600m minimum today
dtkav 3y ago
Polar POD [0] is a spiritual successor to FLIP but is designed to work in the southern ocean. [0] https://www.polarpod.fr/en/polar-pod https://www.polarpod.fr/en/polar-pod
- doodlebugging 3y ago
  Zero emission vessel by design using wind generators and solar panels with battery storage to power things. So much has changed over the years. It really is a great time to be a researcher since all your computing gear fits in a much smaller space and can be powered by options that don't force you to breathe diesel smoke. In contrast, FLIP used 3 diesel generators. I watched the 27+ minute video from 1969 linked by someone else and was struck by how much it reminded me of offshore O&G platforms and drilling rigs with steel walls and diesel generators screaming. The guys in the video wore no hearing protection in the generator room. It was loud on the video and from wandering thru a generator room on land I know it had to be deafening. I have tinnitus from all the loud machinery that I worked around and it does impact your quality of life. As a service company hand you always got the bunks in the cabins closest to the noise sources so there was no way to escape. When you combine the generator noise with the noise from those dot matrix printers you get a nice wide-band noise source. Since the FLIP was studying acoustic signals they must've overcome the constant noise from the platform by filtering. I know from some ocean bottom receivers that I worked with that you can hear individual boats entering and leaving a recording area through a water column that is thousands of feet thick. Since the generators ran 24 hours a day they likely needed some signal processing to mitigate the constant noise. And back in 1969 what OS would they be using? CP/M? The rack they loaded in the FLIP video looked a lot like an old DEC Vax rack-mounted computer that we scrapped back in the 1980's. Another thing I noticed about FLIP is that many of the ladders used to access the different levels appear to be hardware store aluminum ladders as opposed to built to purpose ladders. I think the POD will have the benefit of experience gained with the FLIP to hone their design so that access issues are streamlined and efficient. In their ePOD course (very cool stuff there) about the living quarters you can see that ladders are fixed in position. Thanks for this link. For those that watched the video of FLIP I recommend walking through the courses in the ePOD part of this POD link.
thrillgore 3y ago
The FLIP was a novelty, and there's really not a need to switch orientation now that ROVs are common. It lived and died as an outlier. Rest in peace, RP FLIP.

If they can't find $8M to extend this ones life for 10 years then I highly doubt they are going to get a new one. Unfortunately.

Cthulhu_ 3y ago
Given how much money is thrown around by rich people, I find it so hard to believe that $8M for something like this is nowhere to be found.
- hgomersall 3y ago
  The free market in action! As everyone knows, if nobody is willing to pay, then nobody values it.
  - blamazon 3y ago
    More like the free market inaction.
- Ekaros 3y ago
  I think there are probably dozens of things like this(not exactly but random things) that could use also millions. Like that observatory. And there is only so much willingness to spend money.
- gedy 3y ago
  or maybe California or the federal government's budget?
- kjs3 3y ago
  Doesn't generate enough clicks.
OldGuyInTheClub 3y ago
A sad commentary no doubt. But, it is always tough to get donors to cough up sustainment funds. The glamor is in the new. Might be easier to get more if the naming rights are offered up. Newer isn't always better but one can hope the same foresight and build quality can be brought to a future design.
phire 3y ago
I suspect there is very little justification for a manned platform anymore. It requires are crew of five (not including the up-to 11 scientists). Much of the science would probably be better off without noise introduced by crew and the generators. Scientists might be better off with an unmanned battery powered platform. Or unmanned ROVs. And if you do need a manned platform, the deep sea oil industry now operates hundreds of them. It might be cheaper for scientists to simply piggy-back on those.
- Certified 3y ago
  >And if you do need a manned platform, the deep sea oil industry now operates hundreds of them. It might be cheaper for scientists to simply piggy-back on those. Not that much cheaper. At least in the US based oil companies I have worked with, the cost of sending even one person to an offshore platform can easily exceed 20k USD. Everyone on the platform has to have extensive safety training. Only a few training facilities are setup to do things like Helicopter Underwater Escape Training [1] so the cost is pretty high. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHTk3JNtMlw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHTk3JNtMlw
  - zirgs 3y ago
    20k sounds like peanuts compared to the cost of maintaining their own platform.
gregoriol 3y ago
Is it only about money or could it also be about its usefulness? I have no information on this, but like when Arecibo collapsed, there were discussions about how much it would cost to fix it and how useful it could be. Maybe it has made a lot of research, and some new research directions would better make use of another kind of tool?
yreg 3y ago
It apparently cost 600k to build[0] (6M in 2023 USD), much less than I would expect. [0] https://scripps.ucsd.edu/ships/flip/history https://scripps.ucsd.edu/ships/flip/history
- spoonjim 3y ago
  It would cost $600m minimum today

dtkav 3y ago

Polar POD [0] is a spiritual successor to FLIP but is designed to work in the southern ocean. [0] https://www.polarpod.fr/en/polar-pod https://www.polarpod.fr/en/polar-pod

doodlebugging 3y ago
Zero emission vessel by design using wind generators and solar panels with battery storage to power things. So much has changed over the years. It really is a great time to be a researcher since all your computing gear fits in a much smaller space and can be powered by options that don't force you to breathe diesel smoke. In contrast, FLIP used 3 diesel generators. I watched the 27+ minute video from 1969 linked by someone else and was struck by how much it reminded me of offshore O&G platforms and drilling rigs with steel walls and diesel generators screaming. The guys in the video wore no hearing protection in the generator room. It was loud on the video and from wandering thru a generator room on land I know it had to be deafening. I have tinnitus from all the loud machinery that I worked around and it does impact your quality of life. As a service company hand you always got the bunks in the cabins closest to the noise sources so there was no way to escape. When you combine the generator noise with the noise from those dot matrix printers you get a nice wide-band noise source. Since the FLIP was studying acoustic signals they must've overcome the constant noise from the platform by filtering. I know from some ocean bottom receivers that I worked with that you can hear individual boats entering and leaving a recording area through a water column that is thousands of feet thick. Since the generators ran 24 hours a day they likely needed some signal processing to mitigate the constant noise. And back in 1969 what OS would they be using? CP/M? The rack they loaded in the FLIP video looked a lot like an old DEC Vax rack-mounted computer that we scrapped back in the 1980's. Another thing I noticed about FLIP is that many of the ladders used to access the different levels appear to be hardware store aluminum ladders as opposed to built to purpose ladders. I think the POD will have the benefit of experience gained with the FLIP to hone their design so that access issues are streamlined and efficient. In their ePOD course (very cool stuff there) about the living quarters you can see that ladders are fixed in position. Thanks for this link. For those that watched the video of FLIP I recommend walking through the courses in the ePOD part of this POD link.

thrillgore 3y ago

The FLIP was a novelty, and there's really not a need to switch orientation now that ROVs are common. It lived and died as an outlier. Rest in peace, RP FLIP.