Two legendary research submersibles, and fifty years of Hawaiian undersea exploration, proposed for a permanent home at Bishop Museum.
Pisces IV and Pisces V, operated by the Hawaiʻi Undersea Research Laboratory (HURL) at the University of Hawaiʻi for decades, rank among the most productive research submersibles in the world — their contributions to biological, archaeological, and geological discovery rivaling any vessel of their kind, particularly across Hawaiʻi and the broader Pacific.
The collaboration reaches back to the 1970s and has produced more than 1,000 specimens across the Museum's marine invertebrate, ichthyology, malacology, and algae collections — many representing species new to science. Museum researchers piloted the subs on many occasions, including a $1.5 million project to document Hawaiʻi's deep coral reefs — the featured subject of a new permanent exhibit in the Science Adventure Center — and the pioneering coordination of submersible dives with deep rebreather divers. The partnership has appeared in Nature's Wonders (2014), Journeys (2016), Spineless Wonders (2019), and Taxonomy (2023).
Their legacy runs beyond science. The active undersea volcano off southeast Hawaiʻi Island — the archipelago's next island — was named Lōʻihi by Western science in the 1940s. Cultural practitioners at Bishop Museum recognized the name Kamaʻehu a Kanaloa in mele recorded in Hawaiian-language newspapers of the 1800s and early 1900s, connecting the seamount to Pele's birth from the ocean — and the name was restored. Pisces first descended there in 1987; in 2011 Tom Pohaku Stone rode Pisces IV down its South Rift for the National Geographic film The Alien Deep.
A core purpose of Bishop Museum is to educate and inspire the people of Hawaiʻi. On many occasions, keiki spotting the subs go past have erupted with shouts of "Submarine! Submarine!" The Pisces vessels carry an inextinguishable sense of wonder — the same thrill of exploration felt by the many researchers who piloted them — and the Museum is the natural place to tell those stories and inspire the generations to come.
Retired from service in 2018, the subs have been stored in a warehouse while UH evaluates a permanent home. UH has generously offered to donate both vessels to Bishop Museum, where they would stand outside the Science Adventure Center — one visible from Hawaiian Hall and the Great Lawn — as a beacon drawing visitors in, available for guided tours that let school groups and others climb inside, and as focal points for high-profile events.
Source: Bishop Museum three-page brief, “The Pisces Submersibles: A Legacy of Partnership for Undersea Exploration in Hawaiʻi.” This page summarizes that document for the atlas.
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