A Florida medical researcher and professor has lived underwater without depressurisation for more than 75 days – a world record. He plans to make it to 100.
EVERY day, Joseph Dituri wakes up at around 5am, walks to his work station and basks in the sun that hovers above him.
This sun, however, is a yellow pillow with a smiling face in the centre. Dituri hung it on his wall to remind him of the real sun, which he hasn’t seen in more than 75 days.
Dituri, a hyperbaric medicine researcher and associate professor at the University of South Florida, has been living in an underwater pod in Key Largo, Florida, since March 1. He’s exploring whether living underwater is possible through daily tests on his brain, heart, lungs and blood.
On Saturday – his 73rd day at Jules’ Undersea Lodge – Dituri believes he broke the world record for the longest stint living underwater. But Dituri, 55, is still determined to live submerged for 100 days to complete his experiment.
“It’s not about the world record,” Dituri told The Washington Post. “It’s about living underwater and in an isolated, confined, extreme environment. I have 100 days as the mark, but it’s only because I couldn’t afford to spend 200 days.”
Dituri has long been fascinated with water. He grew up near the Atlantic Ocean in Long Island and served in the US Navy for nearly 28 years before retiring as a commander in December 2012.
Around that time, Dituri was scuba diving near Orange County, California, when he said he saw an 11-inch sea lice. He had believed all sea lice were only a few millimetres long. He wondered what other species he could discover in the sea.
Dituri knew living underwater was possible. In 2014, two Tennessee professors stayed in Jules’ Undersea Lodge, an underwater hotel in Key Largo, for 73 days. Since watching his military colleagues suffer concussions during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Dituri has studied treatments for traumatic brain injuries. He wondered whether living underwater in a pressurised environment could aid brain injuries.
“I said, ‘We have to live in the ocean,'” Dituri said. “Everybody was like, ‘You’ve gone crazy.’ I was retired from the Navy, and they’re like, ‘That’s it. You’ve lost it.'”
Dituri needed more degrees to become a researcher, so he earned a PhD in biomedical engineering from the University of South Florida in December 2017. In 2019, Dituri and four friends stayed at Jules’ Undersea Lodge for five days to test underwater life. But Dituri wanted to be submerged longer, and by himself, to see how his brain and body would respond.
The coronavirus pandemic halted his plans to begin his experiment in 2020, but Dituri decided he would fund nearly half of the roughly $200,000 project this year. The Marine Resources Development Foundation, a non-profit in Key Largo, also helped fund the project, Dituri said.
Before Dituri went underwater, doctors recorded his vitals, including blood pressure, cholesterol, calcium levels, muscle inflammation and stem-cell health. He also underwent anxiety and depression exams with psychologists.
Dituri booked a 100-square-foot pod – similar to a 10-by-10-foot room – that rests 22 feet underwater. The lodge gets electricity, oxygen and water from a cord connected to land. Dituri also attached an ethernet cable to a router on land for internet access. The pod has a small kitchen, toilet, shower and bedroom.
Every three days, Dituri said his research colleagues swim to his pod to deliver food, including eggs and salmon, in a pressurized container. But Dituri can only cook in a microwave because of the increased pressure in the sea. He also makes Café Bustelo coffee every morning. Dituri still teaches his hyperbaric medicine and biomedical engineering classes virtually three days per week for the University of South Florida.
He exercises with resistance bands and takes vitamin D supplements. But his main research has come from tests on his body. He frequently takes urine samples and has undergone electrograms, which record brain and heart activity.
When doctors and researchers visit Dituri, they check his blood and organs. He also meets virtually with psychologists and a psychiatrist to monitor his mental health. Dituri often leaves his pod for snorkeling, and he believes he recently discovered a new single-cell organism.
Dituri said that his cholesterol and stress have dropped, that he spends more of his rest in REM or deep sleep, and that he has produced stem cells at a faster rate. When he leaves the pod on June 9, Dituri will undergo extensive testing to see how his body reacted to the new environment.
Still, Dituri has missed human touch. He only sees his girlfriend and three daughters virtually and recently missed his middle daughter’s college graduation. On Saturday, Dituri’s 80-year-old mother, Mary, will take a scuba-diving course so she can visit her son.
Dituri also misses the sun. He used to watch the sunrise almost every morning after a workout, but he has recently had to settle for his sun pillow. While he yearns for those experiences on land, Dituri still wishes he could stay underwater longer.
“Everything we need is here,” Dituri said. ” … I now know. I need to let everybody else know.”
– THE WASHINGTON POST
