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:: Andreas B. Rechnitzer, Ph.D. - Sports / Education - 1999
 Distinguished Service - 1989
Science - 1968
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Andy Rechnitzer was one of the first pioneers in diving, having made discoveries and inroads and written manuals for all the major fields of diving: scientific, military, commercial and recreational. Andy he was the only NOGI Fellow to receive 3 NOGI Awards- Science, 1968, Distinguished Service, 1989, Sports and Education, 1999 - and he was nominated for a fourth NOGI (Arts) this year!
Andy was a student of Scripps Professor Dr. Carl Hubbs. In 1955, Hubbs and Rechnitzer discovered and identified the striped yellow fish that now serves as the official logo of Scripps' Birch Aquarium (Chaetodon falcifer). While at Scripps, then part of UCLA, Andy, Connie Limbaugh, and Jim Stewart developed the first SCUBA diver training program for ocean scientists, which included such innovations as ditch-and-don, buddy breathing, and the buddy system. That SCUBA training program is the basis of all major sport diving certification programs in the world today, including PADI and NAUI. Upon graduation from SIO, Andy considered staying at Scripps, but Roger Revelle told him to head out into the world. Later, Andy recalled, "It was the best advice he could have given me."
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As a member of the U.S. Navy-ONR Evaluation team, Rechnitzer was instrumental in negotiating the purchase of the deep diving bathyscaphe, Trieste, from Swiss physicist Auguste Piccard. Rechnitzer, along with Scripps alumni, Art Maxwell, Scripps researcher Willard Bascom, and Captain Charles Bishop, USN, (later with MPL), had Trieste brought from Italy to San Diego's Naval Electronics Lab (NEL), on Point Loma. Rechnitzer, a civilian scientist, was made Scientist-in-Charge of Project NEKTON. On January 23, 1960, Trieste dove with pilot Don Walsh and observer Jacques Piccard to 35,800-ft into the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, the deepest ocean depth. The success kick-started deep submergence development in the U.S., and many businesses in San Diego. Rechnitzer was awarded the Navy Department Distinguished Civilian Service Award by President Dwight Eisenhower. He then led the development of the Beaver IV diver LILO submersible at Rockwell International. Andy then joined the scientific staff of the Chief of Naval Operations and Oceanographer of the Navy from 1970-1984. He later joined SAIC as Senior Scientist from 1985-1998. In 2002, the History Channel aired the special "The Deepest Dive", co-produced by Andy and Ed Cargile, recounting the obstacles and milestones on the way to the bottom of the sea.
Andy was also an early advocate of K-12 outreach, authoring segments of books on hands-on marine science for young students. He founded and was first president of the Ocean Institute (Dana Point, CA), which continues to collaborate with Scripps and other scientists as an informal center of marine education today.
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