Tektite habitat

[1][2] "Tektite III" refers to an educational project in the 1980s, using the original habitat capsule used by scientists, which was restored to be functional, but never used underwater again.

[citation needed] On 28 January 1969, a detachment from Amphibious Construction Battalion 2 augmented by an additional 17 Seabee divers from both the Atlantic and Pacific fleets as well as the 21st NCR began the installation of the habitat in Great Lameshur Bay in the U. S. Virgin Islands.

On February 15, 1969, three days later, four U.S. Department of Interior scientists (Ed Clifton, Conrad Mahnken, Richard Waller and John VanDerwalker) descended to the ocean floor to begin the ambitious diving project dubbed "Tektite I".

[10] The United States Department of the Interior coordinated Tektite II, with part of the funding coming from NASA, which was interested in the psychological study of the scientific teams working in closed and restricted environments, similar to that of spacecraft on long missions.

A team of Behavioral Observers from the University of Texas at Austin, led by Robert Helmreich, were tasked to record round the clock activities of the aquanauts by CCTV.

The elite team of scientist-divers included Renate Schlentz True of Tulane, team leader Sylvia Earle, Ann Hurley Hartline and Alina Szmant, graduate students at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, and Margaret Ann "Peggy" Lucas Bond, a Villanova electrical engineering graduate who served as Habitat Engineer.

[2][4] Lambertsen's "Predictive Studies Series" that started with Tektite I in 1969 and ended in 1997, researched many aspects of human physiology in extreme environments.