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Reaching for Inner Space

On January 20, 1961 and in the midst of the Cold War the bathyscaphe Trieste rolls down Pennsylvania Avenue in the Inauguration Day parade in Washington, D.C. The float celebrates the brief visit to the Challenger Deep (the deepest known part of the ocean) made by Jacques Piccard and Lieutenant Don Walsh had in 1960. That event helped provide a last bit of motivation for the U.S. Navy, and ultimately WHOI, to build Alvin. Today, WHOI engineers and scientists are planning to go back to the Mariana Trench for a better, more thorough look. (Photo courtesy of U.S. Navy and WHOI Archives)