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IF YOU’VE EVER seen this odd bell-shaped contraption on Sir Rogerson’s Quay, you might have wondered what on earth it is.
It’s a Victorian diving bell, a feat of Irish engineering that enabled divers to be transported deep into the ocean.
It was used for 87 years in building the quay walls in Dublin, and now it’s going to be turned into a tourist attraction.
The Dublin Port Company has announced that it will be transforming the diving bell into a new interpretive exhibition where people will get to find out more about its origin and history.
Facts about the diving bell:
How did it work?
What happened to the excavated soil? It was put into trays hanging inside the bell and lifted up with it.
What’s happening to the diving bell?
A 350 tonne crane on Sir John Rogerson’s Quay will move the bell to its temporary home, 15 metres away, this week. It will undergo specialist painting and blast cleaning.
The project is expected to open in mid-June 2015. While it’s away, a new structural frame will be constructed in its place using stainless steel panels.
The bell will be elevated onto a two metre-tall steel structure, with a ramped public access route underneath.
A water feature will also be installed beneath this, accompanied by a series of interpretative panels explaining the significance of the diving bell.
The new exhibition will be illuminated at night using energy-efficient LED lighting.
The project has been designed with the expertise of people including architect Sean O’Laoire, the sculptor Vivienne Roche, Tom Cosgrave (professor of engineering at the University of Limerick) and Mary Mulvihill of Ingenious Ireland.
This is the first project in Dublin Port’s plan to create a ‘distributed museum’ of attractions across the docklands and into Dublin Port. Weslin Construction Ltd will carry out the project.
Eamonn O’Reilly, Chief Executive, Dublin Port Company said:
The Diving Bell is a remarkable feat of Irish engineering and Dublin Port Company is proud to invest in its transformation and bring the history of this magnificent structure to life along the Liffey. True to the commitment in our Masterplan, we are working to better integrate Dublin Port and the city.
Betty Ashe of St Andrew’s Resource Centre, Pearse Street, said: “As a port community, we have a duty to preserve local history for future generations. I thank Dublin Port Company for sharing that vision and giving the diving bell a prominent place in the history books for this community and our city.”
More information on the project can be found on www.weslin.ie
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My Grandad worked in the diving bell..
Hi @Carmel
As part of the research for the new exhibition, we’re talking to people about their stories of the bell. and looking for photographs of people working in the bell. If you have any information, or if by any chance your grandfather is still alive, we’d love to hear from you (email: hello@ingeniousireland.ie)
Thanks
Hi. My sister’s have stories from Grandad, who is now deceased. I will get them to send them on to you. Regards. Carmel
Of course some idiot has graffitied it
Surely the big sign saying “DIVING BELL” in front of it should have stopped people wondering what it was?
Yea, but what the flip is a diving bell? Something to do with butterflies?
It’s interesting to know what it actually did and worked beyond knowing that it somehow helped people dive underwater.
That’s an illustration of what it WILL look like in the future. There is no sign there now
Was thing dat meself Mark
It’s good that at least one bit of the engineering magic that once existed along our quays has survived. When I was a kid there was something of interest to see every step of the way from Kingsbridge [ Heuston ] be it the Guinness trains, barges etc until the teeming docks at Butt Bridge began. It’s hard to look at it now with no coal boats or cargo vessels or the Guinness cross-channel boats and just see a museum and playground for ‘artists’. I had my first experience of a ships engine room at the age of 3 when my father would take me to visit the ‘Guinness’ and ‘Clarecastle’ when they were in port. Proper steam ships they were with what we call ‘up and own’ engines :-) The smell of oil and grease was something you never forget.
Imaging working in that of a roasting Monday morning when one of the lads lets a ripper of a stout fart!, no thank you!
Probably the only thing of interest left in the whole of that Docklands area after if was razed and turned into another bland characterless yuppie corporate ghost town that could be anywhere.
Negative Marko… So unnecessarily negative..
You would prefer another broken down blighted carcass to long gone industries?
Yes, because it was a thriving place of culture before the renovations…said no one ever.
The closure of that part of Dublin Port gave rise to massive unemployment in some parts of the city and in turn to the start of the drug problems, ponder on that while you are being artistic.
You can regenerate an area without destroying its character.
Its character was old factories with asbestos roofs. And they have retained the more historic buildings and renovated them. That along with things like the Diving bell, those yokes outside the convention centre and the large chimney near the theatre show that the old heritage hasn’t been completely forgotten
Dublin needs a tourist attraction that is tall and has a viewing gallery. Hope the old poolbeg chimneys will be converted. A 200 metre high viewing platform.
That would be really cool..!!
Just reading about it made me feel claustrophobic. Christ I’m pitiful, I could never not work in an office…
Hopefully it’s light on the top wont cost us 10,000 to change..
It would be nice too if they fixed the quayside lamps.
Of the 45 lamps between Beckett Bridge and East Link, not *even* a single one now works.
2015 facilities maybe?
Sorry, facelift
Any good looking lassies out there are more than welcome to go diving on my bell.
Where does it end
Did any men die in that thing. Very interesting article. Have always wondered what it was driving through town and now i know.
There is a great BBC documentary about using something similar to this in building the Brooklyn bridge. It seems it was hellish down there and if you came up to fast you’d get the bends. Heat, fires, etc.
Look it up, it’s called the engineering wonders of the world or something similar on youtube
Hi Aaron,
happy to report, there wasn’t one serious accident. Though men who worked in the bell have said that if you had a bad head cold, or blocked nose, the pressure could hurt — like what happens in a plane at take-off and landing.
Is it for birth control or piles??? lol.
have your say