Cousteau and his crew sailed across the atlantic to New York to attend the World Oceanographic Congress. Calypso was accessible to all in the following week. They then navigated to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution on Nantucket Sound, then to the Potomac River and Washington, D.C. At Washington, Cousteau was awarded a gold medal as the guest of honour at the National Geographic Society, at a White House Ceremony by President John F. Kennedy. Cousteau also appeared on the Time magazine cover in 1960 as the main feature story.
Cousteau then tested the Hull Number Two, renamed La souscoupe Plongeante – The Diving Saucer in 80 feet of water on the Caribbean continental shelf off Puerto Rico. After many successful dives, Cousteau and Falco aboard the diving saucer descended to 360 feet till they started sinking as there was a short circuit. They released the ascent ballast and they rose up to the surface. 2 months later, The diving saucer successfully brought Cousteau and Falco to 1,000 feet and safely returned to the surface. In the next year, the diving saucer carried geologists and biologists and gathered samples of rocks and new sea creatures with its hydraulic claw.
In Continental Shelf I, known as Conshelf I, two divers, Falco and Wesly, would live in a watertight steel cylinder, Diogenes, for a week at a depth of 37 feet and work at depths to 80 feet. It was successful and they returned with no harmful effects to their body.
In 1963, Cousteau went on a trip onboard Calypso to find the best location for his undersea village, which is 27 miles north of Port Sudan about halfway down on west of Red Sea. He began the Conshelf II stage. Falco, Wesly, cook Pierre Guilbert, marine biologists Raymond Vaissiere and Pierre Vanomi would live in the Starfish House for a month at 33 feet and work at depths to 60 feet. Raymond Kientzy and Andre Portelatine would spend a week living in Deep Cabin at 82 feet and work at depths to 160 feet. This was again successful.
World Without Sun film released in 1964 was made with material from the diving saucer and conshelf I and II ventures. Cousteau earned his second Oscar award for best documentary.
in 1965, Cousteau carried out Conshelf III, where six men, Andre Laban, physicist Jacques Roillet, divers Raymond Coll, Yves Omer, Christian Bownia and cameraman Philippe Cousteau, would live in a sphere at 325 feet for 27 days. They were not able to speak due to the high levels of helium, however they were able to work and successfully returned safely. The aquanauts’ return to the surface was aired live on 17 television stations in Europe. With the material from Conshelf III, his 1st National Geographic one-hour Television special, “The Undersea World of Jacques-Yves Cousteau”, was showed on CBS and produced by David Wolper in 1966.
David Wolper and Bud Rifkin offered a deal that they could produce a television series centered on the quests of Calypso, its crew and the sea. Each episode would focus on a query about the sea and its dwellers and in an hour they would resolve it. Wolper convinced Encyclopedia Britannica and DuPont Chemicals to fund 12 episodes and head of programming Tom Moore to air it on ABC.
On February 18, 1967, at a media conference, Cousteau talked about the devastation of the sea and his start of a 4-year journey to film the oceans and its dwellers for the world to see.
4-year 150,000 mile voyage starting in Monaco in February 1967.
Cousteau, Simone and Philippe would be at sea while Jean-Michel would stay in Los-Angeles.
The Undersea World Of Jacques Cousteau aired on ABC in 1968 that starred him and his sons, Philippe & Jean-Michel. There were 8 seasons, 36 episodes and the last episode aired in may 1976.
in 1969, 2 months after the moon landing, at the Oceanographic Museum of Monaco, Cousteau held a media conference to beseech the United States Congress to limit the contamination he had witnessed from Calypso along the seashores.
in 1973, Cousteau founded the Cousteau Society, a nonprofit environmental organisation. in 1977, there were about 250,000 members.
Oasis in Space series broadcasted on PBS in 1976 about environmental calamities. The first episode won Cousteau another emmy. But he realised that he needed to be more subtle in his approach towards conveying environmental issues.
The Odyssey series aired on PBS, funded by Robert Anderson, the chairman of Atlantic Richfield Petroleum Company (ARCO). Cousteau wanted to send 2 independent teams, one led by philippe and one by him, to sea to produce the films needed for the series. This series again focused on Cousteau’s increasing worries about environmental destruction.
Philippe Cousteau, who was supposed to be Cousteau’s inheritor, died in a PBY Catalina flying boat crash on june 28, 1979. This greatly affected Cousteau. He could not even bring himself to identify Philippe’s body and never spoke about him in public except once.