Karen's husband and business partner, engineer/inventor Graham Hawkes, is arguably the most well-known and prolific creator of deep-sea vehicles. "Graham's idea is to make the deep ocean accessible for human beings -- for science, research and other things." Telling the story of Hawkes Ocean Technologies' achievements has been Karen's part of the equation for the last six years.

     H.O.T.'s vehicles differ from conventional submersibles. Rather than slowly sinking down and floating up using a ballast system, they are quickly powered down from the surface and operate on the principles of dynamic wing forces and flight control. In this way, H.O.T.'s submersibles can cover a lot of territory very quickly. In addition, current conventional models are huge, with cockpits like airplanes, and because they're tied to mother-ships, schedules are outlined years in advance. The H.O.T. microsubmer-sibles can be shipped on a truck or plane and launched anytime, from any ship, or towed with a Zodiac, making the operations much more economical.

     "DeepFlight I proved that we could fly in the water, and also that Graham could shrink the controls down."

     Next came WetFlight, built specifically for the IMAX ride film Dolphins: The Ride. "They asked us to make a submersible that the cameraman could fly through the water and film from the point of view of a dolphin."

     One of Graham's other, earlier, designs, the DeepRovers, inspired a mock submersible that H.O.T. built for the feature film Sphere -- the sub that Dustin Hoffman, Sharon Stone and Samuel L. Jackson used to escape from the ocean bottom.

Ocean Everest
Much of Karen's work revolves around not only publicizing inventions and programs, but also fund-raising and obtaining corporate sponsorship. The DeepFlight I prototype, which goes to depths of 1,500 feet, was sponsored in part by Television New Zealand, Imax, National Geographic Television and Rolex, and was the precursor to their most ambitious project yet, Deep Flight II/Ocean Everest.

     "We're now trying to raise $10 to $20 million so we can build the full ocean-depth vehicle. We call it Ocean Everest because the Mariana Trench is as far down in the ocean as Mount Everest is high." And while the ultimate destination is this deepest point of the ocean, 7 miles down, mid-ocean depths where most sea life can be found, at 14,000 to 20,000 feet, are a focus as well. "It's a very public program and we think that corporate sponsors would be interested. We just need to find the time to get them on board."

Supporting the dream
The small H.O.T. team, which in addition to Graham and Karen includes a mechanical engineer, electronics engineer and a workshop manager, designs and builds the vehicles in a modest garage workshop in Point Richmond, California.

     Because it's not a commercial company, the H.O.T. ventures have always been supported through other endeavors. Graham spent eight years (Karen was involved in the last two) scouting for deep water shipwrecks and uncovered more than 350 modern and ancient vessels. The recovery of their last find, the Royal Captain in the Philippines, was completed by French archaeologist Frank Goddio and recently appeared on the Discovery Channel.

     Three years ago the couple founded Precision Remotes Inc., which builds and markets Graham's design of the first remotely operated system that can carry a weapon, surveillance lens or motion sensor. The product is intended for military and police use to keep personnel out of the line of fire. Their current customers are the U.S. military, some foreign governments and U.S. government agencies.

Underwater flight school
Planned for next summer in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, is the launch of yet another project, Deep Flight Aviator, a two-person winged submersible, and the world's first Sub Sea Flight School, leading to the first underwater pilot's license. Graham will do the training from one seat and the person taking the course would be in the other.

     "It will be a bit like one of the high-end adventure trips you see in Outside magazine," Karen explains. While riding in one of her husband's creations was previously not feasible, she looks forward to being one of Graham's first pupils next summer.

Adventure
Karen has always been attracted to an adventurous kind of lifestyle. At Colgate, the international relations and Russian major got bitten by the travel bug after her semester in France. She got masters degrees at Columbia School of International Affairs and NYU's business school, and worked in nonprofit and corporate PR for several years. Looking for a change in 1994, Karen moved to Colorado and began working for American Adventure Productions in Aspen, where she was an associate producer for TV shows including the NBC primetime feature Bermuda Triangle: Secrets Revealed. She met Graham on her first show. "We started working together fairly soon after meeting and have been ever since, for the past six years.

     "Graham and I do everything together, which I guess says nice things about our working relationship. We enjoy the same recreational activities. The kids (Oliver, 2 1/2, and Madeleine, 1) throw in an interesting challenge, but we just take them along and keep a close eye on them."