Clear-Com wireless solutions, co-stars in an underwater expedition

The specialist in communications and wireless cameras HDwireless chose digital wireless solutions Clear-Com supplied by Audio-Technica to manage your communications during an underwater expedition to the bottom of Austria's deepest lake.

This expedition, part of a research project (Tiefenrausch) aimed at discovering “the sound of the Earth”, lasted for 5 12-hour days of uninterrupted work. To undertake the initiative with all the guarantees, HDwireless considered it essential to have a reliable communications technology, in part because the crew had to obtain approval from the Austrian military to sail to the dive site each day.

Ultimately, HDwireless decided to use the wireless system FreeSpeak Edge de Clear-Com due to the wide range of possible applications and its audio quality, according to Patrick Nussbaum, responsible for HDwireless. “We were not only responsible for communication within the submarine and with the crew on land, but we also used the FreeSpeak Edge system for all broadcast sound for the television broadcast,” explains Nußbaum.

Once at the place of immersion, "At a depth of almost 200 meters, you have to be very safe. If you are out there and you have no way of communicating with the submarine, the OB van or the crew on the ground, you have a real problem. It is a big safety factor," Nußbaum continues.

Inside the submarine

The submarine that took the crew to the depths of the lake housed four people: a pilot, a co-pilot, a television show host and a guest, all of them equipped with FreeSpeak Edge fanny packs. The objective of the submarine's trip was to recover a hydrophone previously sunk to the bottom of the lake that, along with other recording devices, captured the sounds emitted by the Earth.

All members of the submarine crew could communicate with each other and send their signals to the production van television station on land, which was equipped with a Eclipse HX digital matrix system y Iris V-series key panels. Ground and ship equipment could also communicate via the application mobile Agent-IC. In fact, the team did not use any additional audio equipment, as the production was based solely on the Clear-Com systems: "That was a big reason why we chose Clear-Com. The products just work. And we would do all this again using that equipment," Nußbaum points out.