This is basically a small transparent plastic submarine that gets pulled along at high speed by a speed-boat. The submarine is connected to the speed-boat via a long tether. You sort-of lay headfirst inside the submarine, with your arms out in front on the handlebars. The handlebars control steering left to right. Your feet have pedals available to them to control the dive planes (up and down). So basically you get to cruise around at high-speed underwater and control your movement with 4 degrees of freedom (up, down, left, right). Communication with the boat would be possible with radio headsets.
-- DeathNinja, Jul 27 2003

B A C Turtle http://www.halfbake.../B_20A_20C_20Turtle
slower in a shell [FarmerJohn, Oct 05 2004]

I wonder if you could get it to leap out of the water? That would be fun.
-- RobertKidney, Jul 27 2003


I wonder if you could get it to stay IN the water, it'd need to be reasonably heavy to counteract the bouyancy. Have a bun by way of a desposit on one.

P.S. it's not really skiing though is it..
-- neilp, Jul 27 2003


If your tether were connected by a swivel and you wore a pair of flourescent oversized fins, you could cross your ankles and hold your fins just so, then, you could be a spinning lure for a whale shark. Cool.
-- Tiger Lily, Jul 27 2003


I Want one, but I'd rather have the boat to tow it.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Jul 27 2003


Sounds extremely dangerous to me. You could encounter a shallow area very quickly in poor visibility behind a boat, and not have enough time to react. I'm certain that such a device would not be legal to use. Big fishbone.
-- waugsqueke, Jul 27 2003


I like it because it could be a man made lake.

As for actually being underwater skiing. The pod you are in could be dragged along the sandy bottom.
-- sartep, Jul 27 2003


Why bother with the boat? Personal electric submarines are available (just like in "Thunderball").
-- angel, Jul 28 2003


I've seen scuba divers with a motorized thing that drags them around. It doesn't go very fast, though.
-- snarfyguy, Jul 28 2003


Cool idea, but it's really 3 degrees of freedom:

1. up/down (X) 2. left/right (Y) 3. forward/backwards (Z)

(or 6 if you want to include pitch/yaw/roll)

+ anyway
-- suctionpad, Jul 28 2003


If you're really bad at waterskiing you do this anyways.
-- k_sra, Jul 28 2003


Sounds like a good way for an evil villain to try to kill James Bond
-- FloridaManatee, Jul 28 2003


Strange idea [Death]...trolling yourself with a down-rigger.
-- Shz, Jul 29 2003


...or land sharks.
-- Shz, Jul 29 2003


Hmm...Well then, I certainly wouldn't mention that to Jonah.

[Shz] I thought land sharks were mythical prehensile bipeds that wore plaid.
-- Tiger Lily, Jul 29 2003


If the submarine whas sturdy enough you wouldn't have to worry with sharks...well, no more than you do with pedestrians when you're driving. I guess hitting a shark or anything else would hurt anyway
-- PauloSargaco, Sep 11 2003


Realizing you can't pay for this might get you a nip from a loan shark.
-- Eugene, Sep 11 2003


I'm sure I saw this baked somewhere. No links though.
-- EdZ, Dec 26 2003


My freediving mentor used to have a plywood sled he'd tow behind his boat with a scuba diver on it - this was in an effort to cover ground looking for halibut.

When you saw a halibut, you let go of the sled and it floated to the surface, alerting the boat to circle back.
-- normzone, Dec 26 2003


"to cover ground" - an interesting turn of phrase in that context...
-- DrCurry, Dec 26 2003



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