#184: John Vickers (Blue Abyss) — Building the World’s Foremost Extreme Environment R&D Facilities for Space and Deep Sea Exploration

Lay of The Land

John Vickers, Founder & CEO of Blue Abyss.

John is building one of the most ambitious and inspiring projects I’ve encountered while exploring what people are building in Cleveland!

After spending eight years in the British Army, John completed his service at the rank of Corporal in 1991 and transitioned to a civilian career where he worked in management consulting, and leadership roles across IBM and GE Capital.

In 2014, grounded in his desire to prepare for an imagined future of proliferated human spaceflight and extreme environment exploration, he founded Blue Abyss to deliver the World’s foremost extreme environment research, development, testing and training facilities — unlocking our ability to ask and seek to answer some of the most important questions in the exploration of space, aerospace, medical, marine, and other robotic technologies.

Adjacent to Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, and close to NASA Glenn’s headquarters, Blue Abyss is developing the world’s largest and deepest R&D Pool, measuring 40 meters by 50 meters on the surface with a 16m wide shaft plunging to a depth of 50 meters with a volume capacity of 42,000 cubic meters of water.

The Facility will also house ancillary extreme environment capabilities for

• Human Centrifuges to enable training and physiology research at high Gs.
• Hypobaric and Hyperbaric Chambers to enable training and research in pressurized environments.
• and Parabolic Flight to enable microgravity research, training, and public discovery.

Furthermore, besides servicing the gamut of industries from offshore energy to the growing human spaceflight sector, John is deeply committed to educating and inspiring young people to explore and learn about the world around them.

This conversation feels right out of science fiction, but it’s on track to become science reality.

We discuss the balance of ambition and humility, the formative experience of his international upbringing, the influence of his military background and mentors like astronauts and his brother-in-law Sergeant Ian McKay, his appreciation of Cleveland, leadership, persistence, and ultimately the impact he hopes to have with Blue Abyss.

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LINKS:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnvickers1
https://blueabyss.uk/blog/post/blue-abyss-ohio-land-purchase-complete

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbgJ01B89So&ab_channel=BlueAbyss

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