September 11, 2025 • 46 mins
As Axis powers swarm across Europe in the lead-up to D-Day, a small group of scientists refuse to leave their lab, throwing a fair amount of modern ethics out the window (or the sub, if you like) as they race to complete vital experiments in hyperbaric chambers -- the results of which may just change the course of the war. Tune in for part two of this special two-part series, featuring returning guest Dr. Rachel "Big Spinach" Lance, the author of "Chamber Divers: The Untold Story of the D-Day Scientists Who Changed Special Operations Forever."
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
much for tuning in. This is part two two two
two of a continued series on Tiny Subs and d Day,
and I just couldn't be more excited to continue.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
That's my favorite stunt Tumble Pilot's album Tiny Subs and
d Day No I does tiny music songs from the
Vatican Gift Show, which also could be the title of
a Ridiculous History episode.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
Mm hmmm, yeah, and I've been bowling you're an old
Brown's me. We're in media arrests with an astonishing story
that has everything. A little bit of ridiculous crime, some
mad science, some skillduggery, and classified documents and of course
the ever present threat of death.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Let's jump right in or dive from I guess.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Now.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
With this setup, we have learned about the guy's selfish
motives for asking Rachel all these questions. We've also learned that,
and thank you Rachel, We've also learned that there was
a tremendous opportunity, there was immense danger, and therefore there
was a profound need for someone to figure out what
(01:46):
the heck was going on, and this is maybe where
Rachel we introduce our characters, our human elements. We gave
a little foreshadowing.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Before pleased a love story.
Speaker 4 (02:00):
The love story.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
Yeah, there's a little science nerd love story in there.
So we already talked about jbs hel Dane. He is
our leader of this genetics lab at UCL Now. One
of the things that jbs hel Dane did, and I
don't want to make him sound too much like a glossy,
shiny superhero, he was a complicated and nuanced person. He
(02:22):
made a lot of people mad in his time, but
I think that complicated people can also still do really
great things. One of the amazing things that he did
was when Hitler got elected in nineteen thirty three, which
again Hitler some problems. I have notes. Yes, wow, he
was very Yeah he was there. I mean yes, yes,
(02:45):
he was very open at the time of his election
that he blamed Jewish people for all of the problems
in Germany. It was so effective for him to create
a scapegoaded other especially of this Jewish population that didn't
necessarly have a huge platform to fight back, and so
he really manipulated that in order to get elected, and
(03:08):
when he did a huge number of people thought, oh,
it was just talk, He's not actually going to try
and do this stuff, like this was just election talk.
But a lot of other people believed him. Now what
JBS how Dane did was he believed him. And so
immediately one of his efforts that he started participating in
(03:30):
as much as he could was bringing over Jewish scientists
from Germany as refugees. So he worked with an American
foundation that still exists, called the Rockefeller Foundation, and they
were willing to provide some of the money for the
labor funding, and then how Dan was willing to provide
them a lab home. And since he could be like, hey,
(03:50):
they have a job here, that let them legally immigrate
over to England and bring their families to a place
where he it was safer, you know, obviously the blitz later,
but it was safer than being a Jewish family in Germany.
And so he has at this point filled his lab
mostly with Jewish refugee scientists. And one of the things
(04:13):
that he also started doing was he recognized that the people,
the scientists who are already famous, who were very well established,
would have an easy time getting out and sure enough
they did, so he started looking for fresh scientists and
young graduates because he was like, these are the ones
that need help. And so he's got this lab full
of young, very eager, excited to be in England Jewish
(04:38):
refugee scientists. One of them is this woman named Ursula Phillip,
who I have to shout out by name because she
is I feel like my historical sister one of When
I finally found her daughter and interviewed her daughter, one
of the first things that her daughter said was that, like,
she used to be embarrassed because she came from this
(04:58):
family that was historically very wealthy, which she was clumsy,
and she would always spill food anytime they got her
nice clothes, she has food on herself. And I was like, yes, Ursula,
I see you, Yes, I am the same. So I
felt like I really related to her. And there had
been this kind of apocryphal story that when she fled,
(05:19):
she had to run from the Nazis so quickly that
she for like had to have somebody male her her
doctoral dissertation to her, and her daughter just started laughing
and she's like, no, she forgot it, like to pack it.
And I was like Ursula, I see you, so yeah,
so Ursula. Philip is an expert in genetics, as are
(05:41):
most of the people in this lab. Now at this time,
this is before Franklin and Creek had really discovered the
structure of DNA, so we they don't they suspect something
like DNA is influencing inheritance, but it hasn't been discovered yet.
So the way genetics was studying, and this is relevant
to d day, I swear I'll get there, like the
(06:03):
way Noel is like rolling his eyes is like shirt
pop pod math more, I do work in it. The
reason this is relevant is because the way that genetics
to study this time is through math and through studying
what happens on population levels. So if you have one
(06:26):
hundred fruit flies and they all have fruitfly babies, how
are their traits passed down to the next generation? How
many get red eyes, how many get black eyes? And
that is how they are looking at how these patterns
of inheritance occur generation to generation. Game exactly exactly that
(06:49):
the peapods, which if you don't if you don't know
the reference, it's like looking at wrinkled peas versus smooth
peas and purple flowers versus white flowers. This is a
classic experiment that you should have been tortured with in
high school biology. But this is one of the ways
that people were looking at dominant versus recessive genes and
(07:11):
how the ps were passing these different traits down. Yeah,
so same idea, but kicked up seven notches with advanced calculus,
looking at how traits occur across big populations.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
So they're using the math to discern patterns or to
like kind of pull out those kind of stats.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Exactly and how groups will react to something. So for example,
if you make a change and you treat group A
of ducks differently and feed them something, then group B
of ducks and you count how many eggs each produce.
Can you compare those two groups and say, yes, the
(07:51):
difference was what I did with a reasonable degree of confidence,
or no, this is like within the bounds of random
chants like this, this is an amount of variation that
happens to random chance. So this is not a good
way to get my ducks to make more eggs. So
that's that's kind of what they're looking at. Or like
one of the famous ways that they did this is
they looked at the heights of schoolgirls, so they're like,
(08:13):
what height can we expect schoolgirls to be in these
London schools? Now, the reason this is relevant is because
every person is a little bit different from every other person,
even identical twins. You have what's called genetic and biological variability.
That's why Ben, you have a majestic mustache and I
(08:34):
do not.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
My gosh, by the way, I'm in I'm in kind
of a cold war with my girlfriend over this one.
Speaker 4 (08:42):
I'm probably you know what, battles.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Right right in support.
Speaker 4 (08:53):
We're starting to go stash me.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
But yeah, either way, we're both people. But that's a
huge difference.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
And this is also by the way of coming even
in what would say the early days of genetic science.
This is existing in the context of some very serious
and very problematic racial ideas disguised as fact. Right, yes, arguments,
(09:26):
absolutely right.
Speaker 3 (09:27):
So there are two schools of thought at this time,
and both of them exist at UCL in warring genetics labs.
I am happy to say how Dan was on the
good side. He was the one who thought eugenics were wrong.
So he was like, no, no, there are differences, that
doesn't mean better. He was just like, yeah, so he
(09:52):
was on He was the lead warrior on the side
of anti eugenics. So this is a good like I said,
he he was occasionally a difficult person. He was known
for occasionally having explosive outbursts. He was very particular if
he if he liked you, it was because you could
(10:13):
talk to him about his group of science. Like if
he didn't like you, it was because you had like
told him no acrosst him right, and he would try
and make your life hell. You know, He's one of
those personalities. I don't have the expertise to see this,
but I do think it would be an interesting like
historical valuation of someone with like expertise and autism to
look at some of the stuff. But regardless, he was
(10:36):
undeniably brilliant and so yeah he He and Ronald Fisher,
who's the head of the you pro eugenic side, they
had to put their offices on opposite sides of campus
so that they wouldn't physically fight each other, Like, yeah,
they separated the cats so that they wouldn't get in
(10:56):
fistfights as on campus. Right about that.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
This is something that we have to point out just
a quick pause here for anybody who is not familiar
with academia, there is often a stereotype of every every
expert being somewhat milk toast or you know, somewhat somewhat
passive in their interactions and.
Speaker 5 (11:28):
The just and what what you're describing here, I think
gives lie to that stereotype and assumption.
Speaker 4 (11:40):
Is it true that professors fight all the time.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
I don't want to say they physically fight all the time,
but professors and academics and scientists more generally typically are
people who have decided to dedicate their entire lives to
their niche special interest. So it's like, I want to
do this sixty hours a week, so this is my
(12:05):
niche special interest. So you have to imagine that there
are professors who are checked out, like there are. Academia
is a very difficult environment a lot of the time,
and there are professors who get checked out for one
reason or the enda the other, and that's pretty universal.
But for the most part, they at least started with
(12:28):
the fiery passion and deep love of the topics they're.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Studying, and super dedicated and so endicated.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
So this is like, it reminds me of.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
Well, since we already said there was a right and
wrong side of this particular history of genetics. Yes, let's
call it Sith and Jedi, yes separated.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
Yeah, okay, and I will tell you we can take
some like little shot in Fredic Glee when the blitz starts,
they tried like hell to evacuate the UCO campus, and
these two groups are the ones that just refused, and
they like they tried to turn off electricity, they tried
to turn off the gas, like trying everything to force.
(13:12):
They put up barricades. They literally put up barricades. And
these both of these two groups, the pro eugenics Fisher
group and the anti eugenics hell Dane group, were the
ones that were like figuring out how to get past
the barricades so they could go to their labs. So
there's one funny scene that we can laugh at where
Ronald Fisher is trying to climb over like a barricade
(13:36):
and the guards try to stop him and they literally
pants this guy trying to pull because he's clambering our
barricade and they got him on pants, which for our
British listeners I've learned means something else. It would be
his trousers in English. So that's oh right, that's like
(14:01):
how intensely these people are focused on science as a concept.
So the reason not, yeah, we kind of went on
a side journey which was very fun. But the reason
that this matters is because once you start exposing people
to weird gases, I'm gonna respond differently than Ben is
going to respond, and We're gonna respond differently than Nola
is gonna respond, or our silent producer Max is going
(14:23):
to respond. All of us are gonna have variation, and
especially with some of these gases which this lab discovered,
you will even vary day to day. So there's no
such thing as how much oxygen can Rachel Lance take?
There is how much oxygen can Rachel Lance take today?
(14:44):
And the reason they needed to figure that out and
create all of these probability curves and give someone their
percent chance of being safety and was because they didn't
You can't test it for individuals, So they started out
doing it on themse elves. They got in these devices
called hyperbaric chambers. These are giant metal tubes. They're usually cylindrical,
(15:07):
sometimes they're spherical, but either way that's to hold the
pressure in. They sealed the doors shut to paint some
of this picture. These are thick metal walls. Some of
them have tiny little windows, others do not, so sometimes
the only light coming in is from maybe like a
two to three inch little piece of really really thick
(15:29):
glass portal. Others have no windows. Some of them go
shallow enough that you can maybe bring a light in
with you, but that's a fire hazard. That will light
a fire in a chamber and then them.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Is quickly give a recommendation for a TV show. Department
Q features a hyperbaric chamber as a major plot point.
So if you want to see it's very good. You
in particular, I think would appreciate it because it's got
a lot of references to deep sea you know, pressure
tests and things like that. Yeah, that's the first time
I'd ever seen one of these for real, and it's
(16:03):
it's very much a big part of the show.
Speaker 3 (16:05):
Okay, I appreciate the tip. Cannot watch for accuracy yet.
I will go watch it and report back let us know.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
But oh, Rachel, you're just haunted by having to watch fiction.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
I love it.
Speaker 4 (16:18):
What was it you said?
Speaker 1 (16:19):
I remember there was a moment in our previous conversation, uh,
regarding the Hunley and you kicked us some facts about
film explosions, righteously irritated about it.
Speaker 3 (16:34):
Yeah, I still carry that flag, but you know I've
got a lot of I've gotta love flags to carry.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
To spend your disbelief, doctor, spend it.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Film explosions are frequently inaccurately portrayed. Perhaps you need to
go review the previous episode for the full details of that.
It isn't it is in the first book. It isn't
in the waves. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
But also going back to as you said, the hyperbaric chambers,
which will all remember from Michael Jackson, yea, his life
and career.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
So his were clear, Yeah, his were clear. They were
made out of acrylic because he was not going very deep.
But that's that same idea. So that is a great visual.
But imagine that thick walled metal with nobility to light.
And now you when you go in them, one of
the first sensations that you experience is the noise and
the heat because people outside are controlling the chamber and
(17:31):
they are pumping pressurized gas inside. That's how we simulate
high depths, That's how we stimulate the depths of the ocean.
So as that happens, the gas around you is compressing,
it heats up. The gas flows through those pipes is
very loud. So a lot of people have very severe
claustrophobia inside chambers when they don't any other place in
(17:55):
the world, and they often the first time they're in
one got nervous. So when I was running experiments before,
back in professor life, when I would run experiments, a
lot of what I would do is talk to the subjects,
make sure they have time in the chamber, make sure
they know what to expect, make sure they're mentally comfortable,
(18:17):
because this is an environment that can feel terrifying even
though statistically it's very safe. Like statistically it's really really safe.
Unscrupulous chambers like the one in Troy, Michigan where there's
the explosion last year, those can go horribly awry. But
the safety standards for reputable chambers mean that those ones
(18:39):
that are run to code have extremely good safety records.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Can I just say I love the idea of unscrupulous chambers.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
Oh yeah, there are some shady There are some shady
ass chambers out there, so yeah, you want to make
sure they're being run to safety code. Yeah, and so
it is, uh, it is it is an experience, experience
that can feel overwhelming. So this group jbs hal Dane
(19:07):
his girlfriend who he met in the lab. Her name
is Helen Spurway. She loves genetics. She particularly studied nuts.
I cannot tell you how many records I pulled with
her name on them that turned out to be literally
her keeping calendars of what kinds of newts she found
that day and where they were. Like, yeah, these are
(19:29):
extreme special interest people like she would go knock on
the houses of strangers, be like, I notice you have
a pond in your backyard. Can I go waiting in
it and look for nuts.
Speaker 4 (19:40):
A thousand times?
Speaker 3 (19:41):
Yeah? If you explain them to me as.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
You how else can we make our witches brew?
Speaker 3 (19:50):
So then there's another character, another gentleman named Martin Case,
as well as Jim Rendell. So these are kind of
our cast of care collectively, and they start putting themselves
in the chambers. Because the blitz is starting, people are evacuating.
The Royal Navy understands they have a problem, but they
(20:12):
also have bigger problems with the active warfare that started happening,
and so the scientists realize that they are the only
possible solution now they are the only ones with the
ability to help. And so this lab in downtown London
that is making the breathing apparatuses, it's a company called
(20:32):
Ciba Gorman. They open their chambers, They're like, do whatever
you need. You were here for you use our lab
as you will. And so this genetics team puts themselves
in these chambers, pressurizes themselves and starts studying these effects
of underwater physiology. Now what they discover still shapes pretty
(20:54):
much everything we know today about survival underwater. It's wild
how much they discovered, and they discovered it all in themselves.
And we can get into more details while I'll let
you guys kind of lead that, but just to like
let it be known, these experiments do not always go well.
Some of the effects of what can happen to you underwater.
(21:17):
They saw a brief preview with the Thetis crew that
came out so roughed up. But you get seizures, you
get unconsciousness, you get decompression sickness. In one particular experiment,
Helen Spurway kept seizing while she was inside the chamber.
And what's important here is you are locked in a
(21:37):
metal tube. The whole time, there is no outside help.
You are there with your person who's in there with you,
and they are your only hope. So that kept happening
over and over again, and despite everything that they kept
discovering using themselves. Just like the submarine Nurse, they went
(21:58):
in there every time saying, today might be my bad day,
but we need to figure this out. So I'm going
to show up.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
That's crazy because you know about you just got pants
by security and you're like, this also still might be
the day.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
That was the eugenics guy, So that.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Was okay, forget that guy, forget that.
Speaker 4 (22:19):
That guy is a clown.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Yeah, And then they served their math. They took their
math from studying genetics and they started applying it to
their experiments and they started using the math to describe
and give to the Royal Navy what the Royal Navy
could then do safely. So here's how much stuff you
need to bring on your mini subs to scrub out
the carbon dioxide. Here's the mini sub volume you can
(22:41):
build that starts turning into mini subs that are then
scouting the beaches of Normandy in advance of D Day.
Here's what you can do in terms of diving. Here's
how deep you can go, Here's what gas mixture you need,
and so all of these prescriptions start coming out of
this lab.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
Well what are At that point, I think one of
our first questions has to be what are mini subs?
Because I'll be honest, as one of the most ignorant
folks I've ever met, I immediately think it's some kind
of cute submarine.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
Well, I immediately picture the one that imploded that was
controlled with the PlayStation room.
Speaker 4 (23:19):
They argue, how.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Sure are you? They are doable? And I love them. Yeah,
So traditionally that class of submarines has always been called
midget submarines. I feel like we're talking about subs, so
it's probably not problematic. I prefer mini subs just because
that's you know, but either way, these are submarines that
(23:43):
are extremely small, and there's no specific size cut off
between a mini sub and a regular sub, but generally
mini subs are going to have crews of somewhere between
three and ten people at most. And so, yeah, the
one that imploded the Titan definitely would qualify as a
mini sub, and then the ones that the HL Hunley
(24:05):
qualified ad a mini sub that was a crew of eight.
So the ones that they were building during World War
two were kind of a rogue project. We had like
this Royal Navy admiral who was convinced that these were
the way forward, even though they'd never really been built successfully,
Like nobody's built at this point in time a small
sub that has worked in warfare, even though people see
(24:27):
the potential. The reason for that has been largely lack
of understanding of how to survive in them. Like I said,
it's like breathing inside of a plastic bag as opposed
to breathing inside of a room.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
You're not supposed to do.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
By the way, don't do it. It's a bad idea.
You're breathing becomes a lot more sensitive because the changes
around you happen so much quicker. So mini subs need
a lot more careful, in my opinion, a lot more
careful engineering for the breathing apparatuses. Things like that, which,
by the way, that one imploded didn't have a breathing apparatus,
(25:02):
So pretty sure all that, like, oh you've got for days.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
One of the manoked, pretty sure it was just a lie,
so good times.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
But yeah, So this kind of rogue admiral starts tapping
into this hell Dane group as well and being like, hey,
I want to build minisubs. Can you make it work?
I want to minisops.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
That is, by the way, folks, a verbatim and accurate impression.
Speaker 3 (25:28):
Yeah, thank you, thank you. I've practiced that a lot.
That's just including the total lack of British accent.
Speaker 4 (25:38):
I love I love this character.
Speaker 3 (25:40):
Yeah okay, but anyway there, I mean again, this is
a group of people who collectively is all like, yeah,
we got to get creative now. So they were on
board and they started helping and getting in the information
they need. So the the subs he ends up getting built.
At first, the Royal Navy is sort of just mally him, right,
(26:00):
They're like, yeah, we'll let you waste some resources on
this if it'll shut you up. But they're called the
x Craft. They come up with this class called the
x Craft, and so these are mini subs that are
about forty feet long, they're about eighteen feet wide. But
we have to understand is that's not living space. That's
the outer hull. So you have pressure hull, you have engine,
(26:22):
you have tons and tons of equipment. By the time
you actually have worked your way in the space for
people to live is really tiny. There are pictures of
this in the book in Chamber Divers. You can also
google them they will come up. But there is one
spot in the very center of the X craft that
is tall enough for someone to stand up in one
(26:44):
person at a time.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (26:47):
So that's what you're living in when you're talking mini
sub and these xcraft again started out as this sort
of side project, but as this Adimiral is using them
and he's star it's kind of demonstrating their purpose. They
actually also developed the ability for divers to use the
submarine escape apparatuses and exit the X craft on purpose
(27:12):
to then dive. So what you've now created is a
mini sub that can go in shallow waters, approach to beach,
release a person while still underwater, and let them swim
ashore without making any bubbles. Because that's how these rebreathers
were working. Imagine the special operations potential of that for
(27:35):
the first time. That is something that is still a
tactic that is considered like an advanced special operations move.
Navy seals do this, Marineforce recon do this. That is
still a technique that's used today, and it traced one
hundred percent back to the scientific group creating the ability
(27:55):
to have these substually small volumes. So what you see
as the real Navy starts to have their oce moment
and realize how valuable this is. They start trying to
make as many as they can. There's a shortage of them.
They actually lose a couple in a lot of these
early missions, which was really sad, but they're learning from
it in a positive way and they start sending these over.
(28:20):
So the X craft started going over to this little
place called Normandy, and what they would do is they
would sit on the bottom of the ocean. And we
never hear about this part. It's awesome. We never hear
about this. They would sit on the bottom of the
ocean for eighteen hours a day thanks to their ability
to process the breathing gas inside this tiny space. And
(28:40):
then at night, when the moon conditions were right and
this you know, they would come up and they would
release the diver and they would refresh their air. And
this they didn't use diving apparatuses for these missions, but
they would release them as swimmers and the swimmers would
swim in. They would take measurements of the shore. They
(29:00):
measured the angles. They took samples of the sand. They
noted where there were footprints, because if the Germans were
walking there, it means there's no mines, this is a
safe place to walk. They noted where there were no footprints.
Speaker 2 (29:15):
These are all things that were overlooked in that previous
massacre situation. There's an absolute lack of recon right, so
this is okay.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
Yeah, So what Noah's talking about is a raid that
occurred in August nineteen forty two at Deepp, France, where
they tried the same They tried the same tactic of
just like throw as many people as you can at
the problem, and it was a massacre. They just got
absolutely mowed down. The part of the reason for that
was because the beach turned out to be rocks instead
(29:45):
of sand. So that small change meant that those rocks
got stuck in the tank treads, the tanks all through
their treads, some of them literally like caught on fire
from it. So all of a sudden you're making get oh,
the little beach change ruined everything, or it was not
the only problem, but they didn't have recon And so
(30:08):
now before Normandy, you're seeing the importance of recon. They're
taking soil samples. They brought those soil samples back to
the UK. They actually had a NASCAR driver evaluating them.
He was someone who was famous for driving on sand.
He'd been flown over there to be like, what will
this type of sand hole? They were working with geologists.
(30:28):
They had the troops practice on beaches with the exact
same angle and sand type on purpose, so that when
they were running they knew exactly what it would feel
like the day of And these scouting troops, these these
they're called cop COPP. It stands for Combined Operations Pilotage
(30:49):
Parties with the X craft are the ones that got
all of that information. They got it for the Royal Navy.
It was completely classified and that's why it wasn't really
talked to them out until modern times. It's wild you
(31:10):
read these reports of what they were doing. It's wild
because Saving Private Ryan really famously characterized what happened on
Omaha Beach, one of the two American beaches where number one,
they ran aground on like raised ridges that were still
underwater before they reached the proper beach, and a lot
(31:31):
of people drowned because they were running in from these
raised ridges, and then they would get to a deeper
area called a runnel, and because they were wearing equipment,
they drowned. And then they also slightly missed their landing
target and accidentally landed under a big heavy artillery battery,
which Tom Hanks points out. He's sitting in the sand
(31:53):
and he's like, this is an Omaha Beach. That's Omaha Beach, right,
So that those two mistakes were drivers of huge quantities
of the casualties on Omaha. And both of those things
were in these British reports in advance. They knew this
(32:13):
by January of nineteen forty four. These scouts have reported
these two things are very likely at Omaha Beach. It
needs to be approached with caution. It's going to be
the hardest speech to land on. I don't know whether
or not that information was past the Americans. I don't
know whether the British gave it to the Americans for
that reason. But I do know that that shows you
(32:34):
the power of scouting and the power of this underwater
stealth that was developed for that same purpose.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
I mean, it's phenomenal because this is, as you said,
perhaps out of necessity or the legacy of necessity. This
is a story that could not be told for a
little while, right, especially given all the scientific advancements it
informed that would later be a a big part of
special operations in a lot of modern militaries.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
It was the classification, right of the I mean it
was all.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
Classified because this was still secret technology. They still didn't
want people to know what they had done and what
they could do.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
I wish there was still you know, uh, what's that?
What's that old saw about the uh uh radar and
eating carrots? I wish we had some. I wish we
had some.
Speaker 3 (33:28):
Like the Allies had developed a more advanced version of radar,
and to compensate, they started spreading rumors that they discovered
that carrots and beta carotene improved the vision of their pilots.
And that was like, that was like the rumor that
they started to like hide the fact they had new technology.
So what do you think? Can it be spinach based?
(33:49):
What do you start?
Speaker 4 (33:51):
It's got to be.
Speaker 1 (33:52):
It's got to be spinach based.
Speaker 4 (33:54):
How are they how do they know everything about the
beach spinach power?
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Yeah, we got a partially the classified document about spinach.
Speaker 4 (34:05):
I've said too much.
Speaker 3 (34:08):
They're better you're better at holding your breath if you
have quantity.
Speaker 4 (34:13):
That's it. That's perfect.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
So we spread that to the Cambridge five or whatever
as their spine. So in this though, we, as you said,
we have to return to the fact that the experiments
these hardcore maverick rogue scientists were conducting because Noel and
I both love the word maverick, it's just the ten
(34:39):
ten work. They were conducting these experiments in service of
a greater good. So they are they're kind of violating
typical established ethical constraints of experiments, right.
Speaker 3 (34:51):
They are very much for today's standards. So a lot
of what we talk about today when we talk about
informed consent and we talk about ethical standards came from
World War Two, especially the discovery of the atrocities of
the concentration camps. Because I will say I did want
to present a little bit about what one particular German
(35:16):
scientist was doing in the book, because I thought he
had a really interesting ethical conundrum. He was a German
aviator who then started studying some of the same things
for the German side. But he thought it was absolutely
appalling the way the other German scientists were operating, and
so he also used himself. He would not test on
(35:37):
unconsenting Jewish subjects. He wouldn't, but he was being forced.
You gotta respect that, like he was being forced. He's
in Nazi health Germany. He's being told do these things,
tell us these answers, and he was like, I will
do it, but only on myself. So you got to
kind of you got to kind of respect the difficulty
of that situation and the fact that he chose himself
(35:59):
over the prisoners. Because after World War Two, that's when
you start seeing the Nuremberg Trials. The Nurmberg Trials are
where we get most of our modern code of ethics
for experimentation, So that's where we get most of our
what not to do Now, testing on yourself is actually
what not to do things because you can so easily
(36:22):
bias the data, even accidental. So one of the buzz
phrases and science that gets turned a lot without explanation
is double blind controlled study. What that means double blind
is both the person getting the treatment and the investigator
do not know who is getting what. So if I'm
(36:45):
giving Noel some drugs that I want to tell please, yeah,
I do not know if I am giving Noel the
drug or the place ebo because like just we as humans,
we have so much nonverbal communication, we have so many
and inherent biases that we can that is the source
of a lot of scientific error. And it doesn't have
(37:07):
to be nefarious, like it doesn't have to be people
doing it on purpose. And that's why you do that
double blinding. So with these experiments where they were doing
it on themselves, that was out of necessity. But now
it's really considered not allowed because of the ease of
creating essentially junk science or incorrect results. Like you want
(37:28):
to you want emotional separation so that you can be
as objective as possible. But yeah, most of that happened
post World War Two. At this time period, it was
still fairly commonplace for scientists to use themselves first because
like I said, these are people who are the most
passionate about their topics.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
Right, and this is this is where as we're as
we're wrapping up a little bit, as as we're approached
to close, we have to talk about what you established earlier.
This was dangerous for these folks, right, They're not doing
they're not doing a theoretical math, they're not necessary they
are at some point, I imagine arguing over notepads. Sure,
(38:11):
but they're doing it after they've survived this barrage of
conditions in hyperbaric chambers. Can you tell us about some
of the close calls or things that yeah, got close
to going very badly.
Speaker 3 (38:25):
One of the early close calls that they had was
JBS Haldane was the test subject that day, and JBS
Haldane was known for being kind of a large man
for the He was six foot one, which for that
generation was massive, and he called himself fat like that
was his self descriptor. So he was a big guy.
The reason that matters is he's now trapped in a
(38:45):
tiny metal tube with Martin Case who is much much smaller.
What they were testing that day is how deep they
could go well breathing oxygen. And what they did not know,
and they really were pioneers in discovering, is that you
have too much oxygen it can cause a seizure. So
JBS heal Dane is the test subject. They think they're
(39:08):
going down for just a few cognitive tests. Excuse me.
They think he's going to do some math, hey math.
They think he's going to like move a little metal
ball around so they can trust his dexterity. What ends
up happening is JBS how Dane not only has a
massive seizure, but he ends up with multiple seizures with
(39:28):
lots of mental confusion in between. So this huge man
is now barging around this tiny enclosed space trying to
physically bash his way out of the metal walls, because again, you.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
Are confining out, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:42):
You are confined. It is not a place that we
instinctively want to be. He freaks out. Martin cases in
there single handedly trying to restrain his massive boss as
a much smaller person inside this metal walld cylinder where
there is no formal communication with the outside and he
has to try and express this emergency through tapping on
(40:04):
the wall with a hammer, so again there is no help.
So that I was really almost honored to be able
to write that scene in like extreme detail because they
sat down and they had like a really detailed debrief
about it. They were incredible scientists in the sense that
they had timekeepers, like they had stopped synchronized watches like
(40:26):
timekeepers inside the chamber, outside the chamber, and then whoever
was driving the chamber. So there are three different accounts
that were alignable by time as well as like their
debrief after and so I was able to write like
minute by minute of how that works. And in that incident,
Hall Dane is like hurling himself against this metal wall
(40:48):
so hard he fractures one of the vertebrates in his spine,
so he literally breaks his own back. And this is
sort of important because they're at the start of the
time series, so this is their example. Any day could
be your day. This is what could happen. And they
kept getting in, Yeah, they kept getting in, but what
(41:10):
And then, you know, since you said we're kind of
wrapping up, I really love to tie this back to
D Day because I wanted to end the book with
Dday on purpose. So you know, after that there is
like a little wrap up chapter about what they did
the rest of their lives. But the last chapter and
the chapter that I think I'm prouder of that chapter
than anything else I've ever written. I worked so hard
(41:32):
to tell the whole story of D Day from the
perspective of individual people who were there, using like oral
histories and records and things like that, so it is
it is a collection of storming the beaches from individuals
who did it, and the reason that some of them
(41:53):
survived is because they went in with custom gas mixes
in their breathing apparatusus and custom protective here to protect
them against mines in the water that were developed by
this exact group, And they didn't know where it came from,
but they knew that they had these sheets of guidelines,
(42:14):
and those guidelines were rock solid. These were good scientists,
and so on the American beaches, the Ordnance disposal experts,
the frog men, they went in wearing kind of like
lays up foods. They went in anticipating sand because of
that's just the way the tides were at Omaha in Utah.
But on the British beaches, they sent in divers, they
(42:38):
sent in people with breathing apparatuses. They had a hard
time at first because just the number of propellers overhead
made that job really hard to do safely. But as
soon as the propellers start and the ship start being
channeled properly, those are the guys who are down there
underwater dismantling the bombs and mines. To expand and expand
and expand the amount of beachfront that allies can safely
(43:01):
land on. So on the British beaches and then expanding outward,
you have underwater divers dismantling ordinance with their own hands,
and they're able to do it because this group made
them custom blends of high oxygen that was exactly the
right amount for normandy and they had not one single
diving related casualty. So we yeah, we so rarely talk
(43:26):
about in when we talk about where, we so rarely
talk about the things that went extremely right. They didn't
have a single diving problem and it was because this
group had done it all in themselves in their lab
in London during the Blitz to make sure that when
they handed these apparatuses and this information of people, it
was as safe as humanly possible.
Speaker 2 (43:47):
Success.
Speaker 3 (43:48):
Yeah, big success on the diving.
Speaker 2 (43:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
And we just hatched our our own disinfo campaign about
eating spinach, yes and breathing differently. This has been an
absolute pleasure. You have taken us on such a wild ride, Rachel.
Speaker 4 (44:09):
And just so.
Speaker 1 (44:10):
Everybody knows we are not blowing smoke or we're not
breathing the wrong gasp when we say that. Chamber Divers
is a phenomenal book, as is in the Waves A
thanks well, thank you, for creative Actually, you know, thank
you for putting in the footwork and traveling to foreign lands. Yeah,
(44:31):
to get this hidden research. Where can people learn more
about your work and just follow you in general?
Speaker 3 (44:38):
Yeah, so I'm pretty googleable. My author website is Rachel
Lance Rights dot com. People are feel are free feel
people are free to reach out to me through there.
I'm kind of rejiggering my social media presence. I was
primarily on Twitter, trying to move into like kind of Instagram,
maybe blue Sky a little bit, but my handles are
always apt underwater lamps. I committed the cardinal sin of publishing,
(45:03):
which is I was not really available to talk about
the story. So I really appreciate you having me now
and like, yeah, it's been great, thank you now.
Speaker 2 (45:13):
At anytime moving forward, I'm sure we'd always love to
hang out and talk more about this stuff. Thanks for
joining us.
Speaker 3 (45:19):
Yeah, no, I do respond to that, So people are
welcome to reach out to me, and yeah I am.
I am working on a third book. We're going to
go to World War One for that one, but it's
not public yet, so.
Speaker 4 (45:31):
You get the.
Speaker 1 (45:32):
INSIGHTE scoop but a classified classified projectation. Yes, yes, it's
an RL classification. Yes, thank you so much. Thanks to
our super producer mister Max Williams Alex Williams, who composed
this track.
Speaker 4 (45:47):
Uh, Noel, do we have a good.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
Maritime insult for Jonathan Strickland ak the quister?
Speaker 2 (45:53):
Oh my gosh, you put me on the spot.
Speaker 4 (45:55):
Okay? Any good ones?
Speaker 2 (45:57):
Race Kirby Dog, Perhaps that's a good boy.
Speaker 4 (46:00):
Yeah, okay, Rachel.
Speaker 1 (46:02):
What's like a sub mariner insult for someone?
Speaker 4 (46:07):
Or you know anything?
Speaker 3 (46:09):
I mean usually honestly, like real ones, there's just a
lot of profanity.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
Okay, we'll go with These are hard, these are these
are hard drinking Mavericky, there we go all over it.
Speaker 4 (46:23):
Who else do we think?
Speaker 2 (46:25):
Oh my gosh, we gotta thank Chris Frasciotis and he's
Jeff cos here in Spira. We've got to thank a j.
Mohammas Jacobs, the puzzler who is who was a lovely man.
We have nothing bad to say about? Yeah, and thank you,
Thanks you too, but we'll see you next.
Speaker 3 (46:39):
Time, folks.
Speaker 2 (46:46):
For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
much for tuning in. This is part two two two
two of a continued series on Tiny Subs and d Day,
and I just couldn't be more excited to continue.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
That's my favorite stunt Tumble Pilot's album Tiny Subs and
d Day No I does tiny music songs from the
Vatican Gift Show, which also could be the title of
a Ridiculous History episode.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
Mm hmmm, yeah, and I've been bowling you're an old
Brown's me. We're in media arrests with an astonishing story
that has everything. A little bit of ridiculous crime, some
mad science, some skillduggery, and classified documents and of course
the ever present threat of death.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Let's jump right in or dive from I guess.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Now.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
With this setup, we have learned about the guy's selfish
motives for asking Rachel all these questions. We've also learned that,
and thank you Rachel, We've also learned that there was
a tremendous opportunity, there was immense danger, and therefore there
was a profound need for someone to figure out what
(01:46):
the heck was going on, and this is maybe where
Rachel we introduce our characters, our human elements. We gave
a little foreshadowing.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Before pleased a love story.
Speaker 4 (02:00):
The love story.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
Yeah, there's a little science nerd love story in there.
So we already talked about jbs hel Dane. He is
our leader of this genetics lab at UCL Now. One
of the things that jbs hel Dane did, and I
don't want to make him sound too much like a glossy,
shiny superhero, he was a complicated and nuanced person. He
(02:22):
made a lot of people mad in his time, but
I think that complicated people can also still do really
great things. One of the amazing things that he did
was when Hitler got elected in nineteen thirty three, which
again Hitler some problems. I have notes. Yes, wow, he
was very Yeah he was there. I mean yes, yes,
(02:45):
he was very open at the time of his election
that he blamed Jewish people for all of the problems
in Germany. It was so effective for him to create
a scapegoaded other especially of this Jewish population that didn't
necessarly have a huge platform to fight back, and so
he really manipulated that in order to get elected, and
(03:08):
when he did a huge number of people thought, oh,
it was just talk, He's not actually going to try
and do this stuff, like this was just election talk.
But a lot of other people believed him. Now what
JBS how Dane did was he believed him. And so
immediately one of his efforts that he started participating in
(03:30):
as much as he could was bringing over Jewish scientists
from Germany as refugees. So he worked with an American
foundation that still exists, called the Rockefeller Foundation, and they
were willing to provide some of the money for the
labor funding, and then how Dan was willing to provide
them a lab home. And since he could be like, hey,
(03:50):
they have a job here, that let them legally immigrate
over to England and bring their families to a place
where he it was safer, you know, obviously the blitz later,
but it was safer than being a Jewish family in Germany.
And so he has at this point filled his lab
mostly with Jewish refugee scientists. And one of the things
(04:13):
that he also started doing was he recognized that the people,
the scientists who are already famous, who were very well established,
would have an easy time getting out and sure enough
they did, so he started looking for fresh scientists and
young graduates because he was like, these are the ones
that need help. And so he's got this lab full
of young, very eager, excited to be in England Jewish
(04:38):
refugee scientists. One of them is this woman named Ursula Phillip,
who I have to shout out by name because she
is I feel like my historical sister one of When
I finally found her daughter and interviewed her daughter, one
of the first things that her daughter said was that, like,
she used to be embarrassed because she came from this
(04:58):
family that was historically very wealthy, which she was clumsy,
and she would always spill food anytime they got her
nice clothes, she has food on herself. And I was like, yes, Ursula,
I see you, Yes, I am the same. So I
felt like I really related to her. And there had
been this kind of apocryphal story that when she fled,
(05:19):
she had to run from the Nazis so quickly that
she for like had to have somebody male her her
doctoral dissertation to her, and her daughter just started laughing
and she's like, no, she forgot it, like to pack it.
And I was like Ursula, I see you, so yeah,
so Ursula. Philip is an expert in genetics, as are
(05:41):
most of the people in this lab. Now at this time,
this is before Franklin and Creek had really discovered the
structure of DNA, so we they don't they suspect something
like DNA is influencing inheritance, but it hasn't been discovered yet.
So the way genetics was studying, and this is relevant
to d day, I swear I'll get there, like the
(06:03):
way Noel is like rolling his eyes is like shirt
pop pod math more, I do work in it. The
reason this is relevant is because the way that genetics
to study this time is through math and through studying
what happens on population levels. So if you have one
(06:26):
hundred fruit flies and they all have fruitfly babies, how
are their traits passed down to the next generation? How
many get red eyes, how many get black eyes? And
that is how they are looking at how these patterns
of inheritance occur generation to generation. Game exactly exactly that
(06:49):
the peapods, which if you don't if you don't know
the reference, it's like looking at wrinkled peas versus smooth
peas and purple flowers versus white flowers. This is a
classic experiment that you should have been tortured with in
high school biology. But this is one of the ways
that people were looking at dominant versus recessive genes and
(07:11):
how the ps were passing these different traits down. Yeah,
so same idea, but kicked up seven notches with advanced calculus,
looking at how traits occur across big populations.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
So they're using the math to discern patterns or to
like kind of pull out those kind of stats.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Exactly and how groups will react to something. So for example,
if you make a change and you treat group A
of ducks differently and feed them something, then group B
of ducks and you count how many eggs each produce.
Can you compare those two groups and say, yes, the
(07:51):
difference was what I did with a reasonable degree of confidence,
or no, this is like within the bounds of random
chants like this, this is an amount of variation that
happens to random chance. So this is not a good
way to get my ducks to make more eggs. So
that's that's kind of what they're looking at. Or like
one of the famous ways that they did this is
they looked at the heights of schoolgirls, so they're like,
(08:13):
what height can we expect schoolgirls to be in these
London schools? Now, the reason this is relevant is because
every person is a little bit different from every other person,
even identical twins. You have what's called genetic and biological variability.
That's why Ben, you have a majestic mustache and I
(08:34):
do not.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
My gosh, by the way, I'm in I'm in kind
of a cold war with my girlfriend over this one.
Speaker 4 (08:42):
I'm probably you know what, battles.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Right right in support.
Speaker 4 (08:53):
We're starting to go stash me.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
But yeah, either way, we're both people. But that's a
huge difference.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
And this is also by the way of coming even
in what would say the early days of genetic science.
This is existing in the context of some very serious
and very problematic racial ideas disguised as fact. Right, yes, arguments,
(09:26):
absolutely right.
Speaker 3 (09:27):
So there are two schools of thought at this time,
and both of them exist at UCL in warring genetics labs.
I am happy to say how Dan was on the
good side. He was the one who thought eugenics were wrong.
So he was like, no, no, there are differences, that
doesn't mean better. He was just like, yeah, so he
(09:52):
was on He was the lead warrior on the side
of anti eugenics. So this is a good like I said,
he he was occasionally a difficult person. He was known
for occasionally having explosive outbursts. He was very particular if
he if he liked you, it was because you could
(10:13):
talk to him about his group of science. Like if
he didn't like you, it was because you had like
told him no acrosst him right, and he would try
and make your life hell. You know, He's one of
those personalities. I don't have the expertise to see this,
but I do think it would be an interesting like
historical valuation of someone with like expertise and autism to
look at some of the stuff. But regardless, he was
(10:36):
undeniably brilliant and so yeah he He and Ronald Fisher,
who's the head of the you pro eugenic side, they
had to put their offices on opposite sides of campus
so that they wouldn't physically fight each other, Like, yeah,
they separated the cats so that they wouldn't get in
(10:56):
fistfights as on campus. Right about that.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
This is something that we have to point out just
a quick pause here for anybody who is not familiar
with academia, there is often a stereotype of every every
expert being somewhat milk toast or you know, somewhat somewhat
passive in their interactions and.
Speaker 5 (11:28):
The just and what what you're describing here, I think
gives lie to that stereotype and assumption.
Speaker 4 (11:40):
Is it true that professors fight all the time.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
I don't want to say they physically fight all the time,
but professors and academics and scientists more generally typically are
people who have decided to dedicate their entire lives to
their niche special interest. So it's like, I want to
do this sixty hours a week, so this is my
(12:05):
niche special interest. So you have to imagine that there
are professors who are checked out, like there are. Academia
is a very difficult environment a lot of the time,
and there are professors who get checked out for one
reason or the enda the other, and that's pretty universal.
But for the most part, they at least started with
(12:28):
the fiery passion and deep love of the topics they're.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Studying, and super dedicated and so endicated.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
So this is like, it reminds me of.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
Well, since we already said there was a right and
wrong side of this particular history of genetics. Yes, let's
call it Sith and Jedi, yes separated.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
Yeah, okay, and I will tell you we can take
some like little shot in Fredic Glee when the blitz starts,
they tried like hell to evacuate the UCO campus, and
these two groups are the ones that just refused, and
they like they tried to turn off electricity, they tried
to turn off the gas, like trying everything to force.
(13:12):
They put up barricades. They literally put up barricades. And
these both of these two groups, the pro eugenics Fisher
group and the anti eugenics hell Dane group, were the
ones that were like figuring out how to get past
the barricades so they could go to their labs. So
there's one funny scene that we can laugh at where
Ronald Fisher is trying to climb over like a barricade
(13:36):
and the guards try to stop him and they literally
pants this guy trying to pull because he's clambering our
barricade and they got him on pants, which for our
British listeners I've learned means something else. It would be
his trousers in English. So that's oh right, that's like
(14:01):
how intensely these people are focused on science as a concept.
So the reason not, yeah, we kind of went on
a side journey which was very fun. But the reason
that this matters is because once you start exposing people
to weird gases, I'm gonna respond differently than Ben is
going to respond, and We're gonna respond differently than Nola
is gonna respond, or our silent producer Max is going
(14:23):
to respond. All of us are gonna have variation, and
especially with some of these gases which this lab discovered,
you will even vary day to day. So there's no
such thing as how much oxygen can Rachel Lance take?
There is how much oxygen can Rachel Lance take today?
(14:44):
And the reason they needed to figure that out and
create all of these probability curves and give someone their
percent chance of being safety and was because they didn't
You can't test it for individuals, So they started out
doing it on themse elves. They got in these devices
called hyperbaric chambers. These are giant metal tubes. They're usually cylindrical,
(15:07):
sometimes they're spherical, but either way that's to hold the
pressure in. They sealed the doors shut to paint some
of this picture. These are thick metal walls. Some of
them have tiny little windows, others do not, so sometimes
the only light coming in is from maybe like a
two to three inch little piece of really really thick
(15:29):
glass portal. Others have no windows. Some of them go
shallow enough that you can maybe bring a light in
with you, but that's a fire hazard. That will light
a fire in a chamber and then them.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Is quickly give a recommendation for a TV show. Department
Q features a hyperbaric chamber as a major plot point.
So if you want to see it's very good. You
in particular, I think would appreciate it because it's got
a lot of references to deep sea you know, pressure
tests and things like that. Yeah, that's the first time
I'd ever seen one of these for real, and it's
(16:03):
it's very much a big part of the show.
Speaker 3 (16:05):
Okay, I appreciate the tip. Cannot watch for accuracy yet.
I will go watch it and report back let us know.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
But oh, Rachel, you're just haunted by having to watch fiction.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
I love it.
Speaker 4 (16:18):
What was it you said?
Speaker 1 (16:19):
I remember there was a moment in our previous conversation, uh,
regarding the Hunley and you kicked us some facts about
film explosions, righteously irritated about it.
Speaker 3 (16:34):
Yeah, I still carry that flag, but you know I've
got a lot of I've gotta love flags to carry.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
To spend your disbelief, doctor, spend it.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Film explosions are frequently inaccurately portrayed. Perhaps you need to
go review the previous episode for the full details of that.
It isn't it is in the first book. It isn't
in the waves. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
But also going back to as you said, the hyperbaric chambers,
which will all remember from Michael Jackson, yea, his life
and career.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
So his were clear, Yeah, his were clear. They were
made out of acrylic because he was not going very deep.
But that's that same idea. So that is a great visual.
But imagine that thick walled metal with nobility to light.
And now you when you go in them, one of
the first sensations that you experience is the noise and
the heat because people outside are controlling the chamber and
(17:31):
they are pumping pressurized gas inside. That's how we simulate
high depths, That's how we stimulate the depths of the ocean.
So as that happens, the gas around you is compressing,
it heats up. The gas flows through those pipes is
very loud. So a lot of people have very severe
claustrophobia inside chambers when they don't any other place in
(17:55):
the world, and they often the first time they're in
one got nervous. So when I was running experiments before,
back in professor life, when I would run experiments, a
lot of what I would do is talk to the subjects,
make sure they have time in the chamber, make sure
they know what to expect, make sure they're mentally comfortable,
(18:17):
because this is an environment that can feel terrifying even
though statistically it's very safe. Like statistically it's really really safe.
Unscrupulous chambers like the one in Troy, Michigan where there's
the explosion last year, those can go horribly awry. But
the safety standards for reputable chambers mean that those ones
(18:39):
that are run to code have extremely good safety records.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Can I just say I love the idea of unscrupulous chambers.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
Oh yeah, there are some shady There are some shady
ass chambers out there, so yeah, you want to make
sure they're being run to safety code. Yeah, and so
it is, uh, it is it is an experience, experience
that can feel overwhelming. So this group jbs hal Dane
(19:07):
his girlfriend who he met in the lab. Her name
is Helen Spurway. She loves genetics. She particularly studied nuts.
I cannot tell you how many records I pulled with
her name on them that turned out to be literally
her keeping calendars of what kinds of newts she found
that day and where they were. Like, yeah, these are
(19:29):
extreme special interest people like she would go knock on
the houses of strangers, be like, I notice you have
a pond in your backyard. Can I go waiting in
it and look for nuts.
Speaker 4 (19:40):
A thousand times?
Speaker 3 (19:41):
Yeah? If you explain them to me as.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
You how else can we make our witches brew?
Speaker 3 (19:50):
So then there's another character, another gentleman named Martin Case,
as well as Jim Rendell. So these are kind of
our cast of care collectively, and they start putting themselves
in the chambers. Because the blitz is starting, people are evacuating.
The Royal Navy understands they have a problem, but they
(20:12):
also have bigger problems with the active warfare that started happening,
and so the scientists realize that they are the only
possible solution now they are the only ones with the
ability to help. And so this lab in downtown London
that is making the breathing apparatuses, it's a company called
(20:32):
Ciba Gorman. They open their chambers, They're like, do whatever
you need. You were here for you use our lab
as you will. And so this genetics team puts themselves
in these chambers, pressurizes themselves and starts studying these effects
of underwater physiology. Now what they discover still shapes pretty
(20:54):
much everything we know today about survival underwater. It's wild
how much they discovered, and they discovered it all in themselves.
And we can get into more details while I'll let
you guys kind of lead that, but just to like
let it be known, these experiments do not always go well.
Some of the effects of what can happen to you underwater.
(21:17):
They saw a brief preview with the Thetis crew that
came out so roughed up. But you get seizures, you
get unconsciousness, you get decompression sickness. In one particular experiment,
Helen Spurway kept seizing while she was inside the chamber.
And what's important here is you are locked in a
(21:37):
metal tube. The whole time, there is no outside help.
You are there with your person who's in there with you,
and they are your only hope. So that kept happening
over and over again, and despite everything that they kept
discovering using themselves. Just like the submarine Nurse, they went
(21:58):
in there every time saying, today might be my bad day,
but we need to figure this out. So I'm going
to show up.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
That's crazy because you know about you just got pants
by security and you're like, this also still might be
the day.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
That was the eugenics guy, So that.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Was okay, forget that guy, forget that.
Speaker 4 (22:19):
That guy is a clown.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Yeah, And then they served their math. They took their
math from studying genetics and they started applying it to
their experiments and they started using the math to describe
and give to the Royal Navy what the Royal Navy
could then do safely. So here's how much stuff you
need to bring on your mini subs to scrub out
the carbon dioxide. Here's the mini sub volume you can
(22:41):
build that starts turning into mini subs that are then
scouting the beaches of Normandy in advance of D Day.
Here's what you can do in terms of diving. Here's
how deep you can go, Here's what gas mixture you need,
and so all of these prescriptions start coming out of
this lab.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
Well what are At that point, I think one of
our first questions has to be what are mini subs?
Because I'll be honest, as one of the most ignorant
folks I've ever met, I immediately think it's some kind
of cute submarine.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
Well, I immediately picture the one that imploded that was
controlled with the PlayStation room.
Speaker 4 (23:19):
They argue, how.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Sure are you? They are doable? And I love them. Yeah,
So traditionally that class of submarines has always been called
midget submarines. I feel like we're talking about subs, so
it's probably not problematic. I prefer mini subs just because
that's you know, but either way, these are submarines that
(23:43):
are extremely small, and there's no specific size cut off
between a mini sub and a regular sub, but generally
mini subs are going to have crews of somewhere between
three and ten people at most. And so, yeah, the
one that imploded the Titan definitely would qualify as a
mini sub, and then the ones that the HL Hunley
(24:05):
qualified ad a mini sub that was a crew of eight.
So the ones that they were building during World War
two were kind of a rogue project. We had like
this Royal Navy admiral who was convinced that these were
the way forward, even though they'd never really been built successfully,
Like nobody's built at this point in time a small
sub that has worked in warfare, even though people see
(24:27):
the potential. The reason for that has been largely lack
of understanding of how to survive in them. Like I said,
it's like breathing inside of a plastic bag as opposed
to breathing inside of a room.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
You're not supposed to do.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
By the way, don't do it. It's a bad idea.
You're breathing becomes a lot more sensitive because the changes
around you happen so much quicker. So mini subs need
a lot more careful, in my opinion, a lot more
careful engineering for the breathing apparatuses. Things like that, which,
by the way, that one imploded didn't have a breathing apparatus,
(25:02):
So pretty sure all that, like, oh you've got for days.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
One of the manoked, pretty sure it was just a lie,
so good times.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
But yeah, So this kind of rogue admiral starts tapping
into this hell Dane group as well and being like, hey,
I want to build minisubs. Can you make it work?
I want to minisops.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
That is, by the way, folks, a verbatim and accurate impression.
Speaker 3 (25:28):
Yeah, thank you, thank you. I've practiced that a lot.
That's just including the total lack of British accent.
Speaker 4 (25:38):
I love I love this character.
Speaker 3 (25:40):
Yeah okay, but anyway there, I mean again, this is
a group of people who collectively is all like, yeah,
we got to get creative now. So they were on
board and they started helping and getting in the information
they need. So the the subs he ends up getting built.
At first, the Royal Navy is sort of just mally him, right,
(26:00):
They're like, yeah, we'll let you waste some resources on
this if it'll shut you up. But they're called the
x Craft. They come up with this class called the
x Craft, and so these are mini subs that are
about forty feet long, they're about eighteen feet wide. But
we have to understand is that's not living space. That's
the outer hull. So you have pressure hull, you have engine,
(26:22):
you have tons and tons of equipment. By the time
you actually have worked your way in the space for
people to live is really tiny. There are pictures of
this in the book in Chamber Divers. You can also
google them they will come up. But there is one
spot in the very center of the X craft that
is tall enough for someone to stand up in one
(26:44):
person at a time.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (26:47):
So that's what you're living in when you're talking mini
sub and these xcraft again started out as this sort
of side project, but as this Adimiral is using them
and he's star it's kind of demonstrating their purpose. They
actually also developed the ability for divers to use the
submarine escape apparatuses and exit the X craft on purpose
(27:12):
to then dive. So what you've now created is a
mini sub that can go in shallow waters, approach to beach,
release a person while still underwater, and let them swim
ashore without making any bubbles. Because that's how these rebreathers
were working. Imagine the special operations potential of that for
(27:35):
the first time. That is something that is still a
tactic that is considered like an advanced special operations move.
Navy seals do this, Marineforce recon do this. That is
still a technique that's used today, and it traced one
hundred percent back to the scientific group creating the ability
(27:55):
to have these substually small volumes. So what you see
as the real Navy starts to have their oce moment
and realize how valuable this is. They start trying to
make as many as they can. There's a shortage of them.
They actually lose a couple in a lot of these
early missions, which was really sad, but they're learning from
it in a positive way and they start sending these over.
(28:20):
So the X craft started going over to this little
place called Normandy, and what they would do is they
would sit on the bottom of the ocean. And we
never hear about this part. It's awesome. We never hear
about this. They would sit on the bottom of the
ocean for eighteen hours a day thanks to their ability
to process the breathing gas inside this tiny space. And
(28:40):
then at night, when the moon conditions were right and
this you know, they would come up and they would
release the diver and they would refresh their air. And
this they didn't use diving apparatuses for these missions, but
they would release them as swimmers and the swimmers would
swim in. They would take measurements of the shore. They
(29:00):
measured the angles. They took samples of the sand. They
noted where there were footprints, because if the Germans were
walking there, it means there's no mines, this is a
safe place to walk. They noted where there were no footprints.
Speaker 2 (29:15):
These are all things that were overlooked in that previous
massacre situation. There's an absolute lack of recon right, so
this is okay.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
Yeah, So what Noah's talking about is a raid that
occurred in August nineteen forty two at Deepp, France, where
they tried the same They tried the same tactic of
just like throw as many people as you can at
the problem, and it was a massacre. They just got
absolutely mowed down. The part of the reason for that
was because the beach turned out to be rocks instead
(29:45):
of sand. So that small change meant that those rocks
got stuck in the tank treads, the tanks all through
their treads, some of them literally like caught on fire
from it. So all of a sudden you're making get oh,
the little beach change ruined everything, or it was not
the only problem, but they didn't have recon And so
(30:08):
now before Normandy, you're seeing the importance of recon. They're
taking soil samples. They brought those soil samples back to
the UK. They actually had a NASCAR driver evaluating them.
He was someone who was famous for driving on sand.
He'd been flown over there to be like, what will
this type of sand hole? They were working with geologists.
(30:28):
They had the troops practice on beaches with the exact
same angle and sand type on purpose, so that when
they were running they knew exactly what it would feel
like the day of And these scouting troops, these these
they're called cop COPP. It stands for Combined Operations Pilotage
(30:49):
Parties with the X craft are the ones that got
all of that information. They got it for the Royal Navy.
It was completely classified and that's why it wasn't really
talked to them out until modern times. It's wild you
(31:10):
read these reports of what they were doing. It's wild
because Saving Private Ryan really famously characterized what happened on
Omaha Beach, one of the two American beaches where number one,
they ran aground on like raised ridges that were still
underwater before they reached the proper beach, and a lot
(31:31):
of people drowned because they were running in from these
raised ridges, and then they would get to a deeper
area called a runnel, and because they were wearing equipment,
they drowned. And then they also slightly missed their landing
target and accidentally landed under a big heavy artillery battery,
which Tom Hanks points out. He's sitting in the sand
(31:53):
and he's like, this is an Omaha Beach. That's Omaha Beach, right,
So that those two mistakes were drivers of huge quantities
of the casualties on Omaha. And both of those things
were in these British reports in advance. They knew this
(32:13):
by January of nineteen forty four. These scouts have reported
these two things are very likely at Omaha Beach. It
needs to be approached with caution. It's going to be
the hardest speech to land on. I don't know whether
or not that information was past the Americans. I don't
know whether the British gave it to the Americans for
that reason. But I do know that that shows you
(32:34):
the power of scouting and the power of this underwater
stealth that was developed for that same purpose.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
I mean, it's phenomenal because this is, as you said,
perhaps out of necessity or the legacy of necessity. This
is a story that could not be told for a
little while, right, especially given all the scientific advancements it
informed that would later be a a big part of
special operations in a lot of modern militaries.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
It was the classification, right of the I mean it
was all.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
Classified because this was still secret technology. They still didn't
want people to know what they had done and what
they could do.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
I wish there was still you know, uh, what's that?
What's that old saw about the uh uh radar and
eating carrots? I wish we had some. I wish we
had some.
Speaker 3 (33:28):
Like the Allies had developed a more advanced version of radar,
and to compensate, they started spreading rumors that they discovered
that carrots and beta carotene improved the vision of their pilots.
And that was like, that was like the rumor that
they started to like hide the fact they had new technology.
So what do you think? Can it be spinach based?
(33:49):
What do you start?
Speaker 4 (33:51):
It's got to be.
Speaker 1 (33:52):
It's got to be spinach based.
Speaker 4 (33:54):
How are they how do they know everything about the
beach spinach power?
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Yeah, we got a partially the classified document about spinach.
Speaker 4 (34:05):
I've said too much.
Speaker 3 (34:08):
They're better you're better at holding your breath if you
have quantity.
Speaker 4 (34:13):
That's it. That's perfect.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
So we spread that to the Cambridge five or whatever
as their spine. So in this though, we, as you said,
we have to return to the fact that the experiments
these hardcore maverick rogue scientists were conducting because Noel and
I both love the word maverick, it's just the ten
(34:39):
ten work. They were conducting these experiments in service of
a greater good. So they are they're kind of violating
typical established ethical constraints of experiments, right.
Speaker 3 (34:51):
They are very much for today's standards. So a lot
of what we talk about today when we talk about
informed consent and we talk about ethical standards came from
World War Two, especially the discovery of the atrocities of
the concentration camps. Because I will say I did want
to present a little bit about what one particular German
(35:16):
scientist was doing in the book, because I thought he
had a really interesting ethical conundrum. He was a German
aviator who then started studying some of the same things
for the German side. But he thought it was absolutely
appalling the way the other German scientists were operating, and
so he also used himself. He would not test on
(35:37):
unconsenting Jewish subjects. He wouldn't, but he was being forced.
You gotta respect that, like he was being forced. He's
in Nazi health Germany. He's being told do these things,
tell us these answers, and he was like, I will
do it, but only on myself. So you got to
kind of you got to kind of respect the difficulty
of that situation and the fact that he chose himself
(35:59):
over the prisoners. Because after World War Two, that's when
you start seeing the Nuremberg Trials. The Nurmberg Trials are
where we get most of our modern code of ethics
for experimentation, So that's where we get most of our
what not to do Now, testing on yourself is actually
what not to do things because you can so easily
(36:22):
bias the data, even accidental. So one of the buzz
phrases and science that gets turned a lot without explanation
is double blind controlled study. What that means double blind
is both the person getting the treatment and the investigator
do not know who is getting what. So if I'm
(36:45):
giving Noel some drugs that I want to tell please, yeah,
I do not know if I am giving Noel the
drug or the place ebo because like just we as humans,
we have so much nonverbal communication, we have so many
and inherent biases that we can that is the source
of a lot of scientific error. And it doesn't have
(37:07):
to be nefarious, like it doesn't have to be people
doing it on purpose. And that's why you do that
double blinding. So with these experiments where they were doing
it on themselves, that was out of necessity. But now
it's really considered not allowed because of the ease of
creating essentially junk science or incorrect results. Like you want
(37:28):
to you want emotional separation so that you can be
as objective as possible. But yeah, most of that happened
post World War Two. At this time period, it was
still fairly commonplace for scientists to use themselves first because
like I said, these are people who are the most
passionate about their topics.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
Right, and this is this is where as we're as
we're wrapping up a little bit, as as we're approached
to close, we have to talk about what you established earlier.
This was dangerous for these folks, right, They're not doing
they're not doing a theoretical math, they're not necessary they
are at some point, I imagine arguing over notepads. Sure,
(38:11):
but they're doing it after they've survived this barrage of
conditions in hyperbaric chambers. Can you tell us about some
of the close calls or things that yeah, got close
to going very badly.
Speaker 3 (38:25):
One of the early close calls that they had was
JBS Haldane was the test subject that day, and JBS
Haldane was known for being kind of a large man
for the He was six foot one, which for that
generation was massive, and he called himself fat like that
was his self descriptor. So he was a big guy.
The reason that matters is he's now trapped in a
(38:45):
tiny metal tube with Martin Case who is much much smaller.
What they were testing that day is how deep they
could go well breathing oxygen. And what they did not know,
and they really were pioneers in discovering, is that you
have too much oxygen it can cause a seizure. So
JBS heal Dane is the test subject. They think they're
(39:08):
going down for just a few cognitive tests. Excuse me.
They think he's going to do some math, hey math.
They think he's going to like move a little metal
ball around so they can trust his dexterity. What ends
up happening is JBS how Dane not only has a
massive seizure, but he ends up with multiple seizures with
(39:28):
lots of mental confusion in between. So this huge man
is now barging around this tiny enclosed space trying to
physically bash his way out of the metal walls, because again, you.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
Are confining out, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:42):
You are confined. It is not a place that we
instinctively want to be. He freaks out. Martin cases in
there single handedly trying to restrain his massive boss as
a much smaller person inside this metal walld cylinder where
there is no formal communication with the outside and he
has to try and express this emergency through tapping on
(40:04):
the wall with a hammer, so again there is no help.
So that I was really almost honored to be able
to write that scene in like extreme detail because they
sat down and they had like a really detailed debrief
about it. They were incredible scientists in the sense that
they had timekeepers, like they had stopped synchronized watches like
(40:26):
timekeepers inside the chamber, outside the chamber, and then whoever
was driving the chamber. So there are three different accounts
that were alignable by time as well as like their
debrief after and so I was able to write like
minute by minute of how that works. And in that incident,
Hall Dane is like hurling himself against this metal wall
(40:48):
so hard he fractures one of the vertebrates in his spine,
so he literally breaks his own back. And this is
sort of important because they're at the start of the
time series, so this is their example. Any day could
be your day. This is what could happen. And they
kept getting in, Yeah, they kept getting in, but what
(41:10):
And then, you know, since you said we're kind of
wrapping up, I really love to tie this back to
D Day because I wanted to end the book with
Dday on purpose. So you know, after that there is
like a little wrap up chapter about what they did
the rest of their lives. But the last chapter and
the chapter that I think I'm prouder of that chapter
than anything else I've ever written. I worked so hard
(41:32):
to tell the whole story of D Day from the
perspective of individual people who were there, using like oral
histories and records and things like that, so it is
it is a collection of storming the beaches from individuals
who did it, and the reason that some of them
(41:53):
survived is because they went in with custom gas mixes
in their breathing apparatusus and custom protective here to protect
them against mines in the water that were developed by
this exact group, And they didn't know where it came from,
but they knew that they had these sheets of guidelines,
(42:14):
and those guidelines were rock solid. These were good scientists,
and so on the American beaches, the Ordnance disposal experts,
the frog men, they went in wearing kind of like
lays up foods. They went in anticipating sand because of
that's just the way the tides were at Omaha in Utah.
But on the British beaches, they sent in divers, they
(42:38):
sent in people with breathing apparatuses. They had a hard
time at first because just the number of propellers overhead
made that job really hard to do safely. But as
soon as the propellers start and the ship start being
channeled properly, those are the guys who are down there
underwater dismantling the bombs and mines. To expand and expand
and expand the amount of beachfront that allies can safely
(43:01):
land on. So on the British beaches and then expanding outward,
you have underwater divers dismantling ordinance with their own hands,
and they're able to do it because this group made
them custom blends of high oxygen that was exactly the
right amount for normandy and they had not one single
diving related casualty. So we yeah, we so rarely talk
(43:26):
about in when we talk about where, we so rarely
talk about the things that went extremely right. They didn't
have a single diving problem and it was because this
group had done it all in themselves in their lab
in London during the Blitz to make sure that when
they handed these apparatuses and this information of people, it
was as safe as humanly possible.
Speaker 2 (43:47):
Success.
Speaker 3 (43:48):
Yeah, big success on the diving.
Speaker 2 (43:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
And we just hatched our our own disinfo campaign about
eating spinach, yes and breathing differently. This has been an
absolute pleasure. You have taken us on such a wild ride, Rachel.
Speaker 4 (44:09):
And just so.
Speaker 1 (44:10):
Everybody knows we are not blowing smoke or we're not
breathing the wrong gasp when we say that. Chamber Divers
is a phenomenal book, as is in the Waves A
thanks well, thank you, for creative Actually, you know, thank
you for putting in the footwork and traveling to foreign lands. Yeah,
(44:31):
to get this hidden research. Where can people learn more
about your work and just follow you in general?
Speaker 3 (44:38):
Yeah, so I'm pretty googleable. My author website is Rachel
Lance Rights dot com. People are feel are free feel
people are free to reach out to me through there.
I'm kind of rejiggering my social media presence. I was
primarily on Twitter, trying to move into like kind of Instagram,
maybe blue Sky a little bit, but my handles are
always apt underwater lamps. I committed the cardinal sin of publishing,
(45:03):
which is I was not really available to talk about
the story. So I really appreciate you having me now
and like, yeah, it's been great, thank you now.
Speaker 2 (45:13):
At anytime moving forward, I'm sure we'd always love to
hang out and talk more about this stuff. Thanks for
joining us.
Speaker 3 (45:19):
Yeah, no, I do respond to that, So people are
welcome to reach out to me, and yeah I am.
I am working on a third book. We're going to
go to World War One for that one, but it's
not public yet, so.
Speaker 4 (45:31):
You get the.
Speaker 1 (45:32):
INSIGHTE scoop but a classified classified projectation. Yes, yes, it's
an RL classification. Yes, thank you so much. Thanks to
our super producer mister Max Williams Alex Williams, who composed
this track.
Speaker 4 (45:47):
Uh, Noel, do we have a good.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
Maritime insult for Jonathan Strickland ak the quister?
Speaker 2 (45:53):
Oh my gosh, you put me on the spot.
Speaker 4 (45:55):
Okay? Any good ones?
Speaker 2 (45:57):
Race Kirby Dog, Perhaps that's a good boy.
Speaker 4 (46:00):
Yeah, okay, Rachel.
Speaker 1 (46:02):
What's like a sub mariner insult for someone?
Speaker 4 (46:07):
Or you know anything?
Speaker 3 (46:09):
I mean usually honestly, like real ones, there's just a
lot of profanity.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
Okay, we'll go with These are hard, these are these
are hard drinking Mavericky, there we go all over it.
Speaker 4 (46:23):
Who else do we think?
Speaker 2 (46:25):
Oh my gosh, we gotta thank Chris Frasciotis and he's
Jeff cos here in Spira. We've got to thank a j.
Mohammas Jacobs, the puzzler who is who was a lovely man.
We have nothing bad to say about? Yeah, and thank you,
Thanks you too, but we'll see you next.
Speaker 3 (46:39):
Time, folks.
Speaker 2 (46:46):
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