Blancpain's Fifty Fathoms Tech Gombessa: A 70th Anniversary Update Dedicated to Professional Divers

Seventy years have passed since the introduction of the Fifty Fathoms, the forerunner of modern diver watches. To keep up with the remarkable technological advances in diving, Blancpain has introduced the Fifty Fathoms Tech Gombessa. This innovative product bridges the gap between "modern divers" and "modern diving."

The latest Fifty Fathoms model reinvents the "modern diver's watch"

　The influence of the 1953 Blancpain Fifty Fathoms on subsequent generations of diver's watches is immeasurable. While there were certainly several waterproof watches available at the time, only a handful featured a malfunction-proof rotating bezel for measuring dive time. Furthermore, the Fifty Fathoms was the only watch designed specifically for professional use, taking into account the effects of magnetic fields emitted by diving equipment of the time.

　However, the evolution of diver's watches since the creation of the Fifty Fathoms standard has, without fear of being misunderstood, been quite conservative. It is true that advances in case processing technology and gasket materials have significantly improved water resistance, and the widespread use of silicon balance springs has made it possible to achieve previously unimaginable levels of magnetic resistance.

　However, these were merely improvements on existing watches, while diving technology itself evolved significantly, leaving the dive watch behind. Particularly remarkable was the use of rebreathers. Rebreathers circulate breathing gas supplied from a tank back into the tank rather than exhaling it underwater, extending the maximum diving time for scuba diving from around one hour to around three hours.

　The Fifty Fathoms Tech Gombessa bridges this gap between modern diving and modern diver's watches. It's a modern professional diver's watch, co-developed by President and CEO Marc A. Hayek and Laurent Ballesta, founder of the Gombessa ocean research project supported by Blancpain.

　During the Gombessa's Tamataroa mission, the watch will use the aforementioned rebreather to dive for approximately three hours each time in order to observe and investigate hammerhead sharks. To accommodate this research, the bezel's scale has been changed to three hours, and the key feature of this model is that it measures dive time in combination with a sub-hour hand that makes one rotation every three hours.

　The Tech Gombessa isn't particularly technologically advanced. It simply changes the bezel scale and adds a deceleration wheel for the secondary hour hand. Yet, it's more innovative than any other diver's watch. It updates the "modern diver" style that Gombessa pioneered 70 years ago, and while it's aimed at a very limited number of professional wearers, it's also sold as a standard model.

　Blancpain's comment that this is a standard edition watch and that "it is a watch that cannot be completed in one go, in order to continue modernizing," shows that the development of this model is a declaration of the company's determination to continue updating modern divers. For a company that advocates "innovation is tradition," the Fifty Fathoms Tech Gombessa is currently its most "typical" product.