Submarine Voyage

   It was Dennis Hurd who developed an idea of recreational submarines. It was Hurd whom started all the miraculous tours under water with. Maui is not an exception- everyone who is having a rest on Maui take an opportunity to submerge himself into underwater paradise. The fact is that Hurd was working in the drilling company and once they inspected oil rigs in the North Sea. Hurd watched the staff admiring the underwater world, he decided to build his own passenger submarines that could take people underwater to explore the sea beauty. The idea was to design a submersible vehicle that would have a capability of taking several people on board at the same time and going underwater for at least hundred feet for an hour or less. At the same time this vehicle must have a comfortable seating area and large windows through which passengers can enjoy underwater marine life. The first battery-powered passenger-submarine was called Atlantis I, which was send to its first voyage at Cayman Islands on December 1985. In February 1986, Atlantis II was built and featured in the World Expo at Vancouver, Canada. It had been technically improved and had become sophisticated enough to sail a great distance to Barbados from Canada. The Atlantis II designs and improvements inspired Hurd to build the third Atlantis, a submarine that could seat forty eight people at the same time. Atlantis III had a great success at U.S. Virgin Islands and was quickly certified by the U.S. Coast Guard. In addition to building the submarines, Hurd founded a Living Classroom program, where kids could learn all about the marine life while riding on the submarine under the surface of the ocean. The constant innovation and inspiration made Hurd a head of the international company with over four hundred and fifty employees and a fleet of eleven high-tech submarines, majority of which stationed at Maui. More than one million visitors took tours on Atlantis Submarines each year, and this fact speaks for the popularity of this unique underwater experience. Everyone wants to join paradise on Maui.