Troy was a submarine designed by oceanographer Fabien Cousteau and engineer Eddie Paul to look like a great white shark.
To breathe, Cousteau carried full diving gear weighing about 80 pounds (36 kg), providing about 6.5 hours of air.
[1] Troy was covered in SkinFlex fabric combined with glass and sand to make it look and feel like shark skin.
[4] Under that was a layer of bullet-proof Lexan and 2-inch-thick (5.1 cm) steel "ribs" to allow the submarine to survive a shark attack.
[1][5] Troy was designed to move in a shark-like manner using a series of joysticks to control speed, direction, and pitch.
[1] After a year of trial and error in Paul's workshop and pool, the submarine was finally ready for open water testing.
[4] Due, in part, to simultaneous documentary filming, overtime payments accumulated and the vessel ended up costing $200,000.
[4] They stayed about 23 to 29 feet (7.0 to 8.8 m) away from it, the length of an adult shark, and rolled their eyes, puffed their gills, and changed directions in response to it.
[3][4][9][6] In the United States, National Geographic and The New York Times were among dozens of publications with lengthy articles about the submarine.
[10] The documentary, named Shark: Mind of a Demon, was produced by Deep Blue Productions and aired on CBS.