Shadow Divers Quotes

“When things are easy a person doesn’t really learn about himself. It’s what a person does at the moment of his greatest struggle that shows him who he really is. Some people never get that moment. The U-Who is my moment. What I do now is what I am.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“Most men, it seemed to them, went through life never really knowing themselves. A man might consider himself noble or brave or just, they believed, but until he was truly tested it would always be mere opinion.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“In the United States, of the ten million certified scuba divers, it is likely that only a few hundred dive deep for shipwrecks. To those few, it is not a matter of if they will taste death, only of whether they'll swallow.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers

“Many dead divers have been found inside shipwrecks with more than enough air remaining to have made it to the surface. It is not that they chose to die, but rather that they could no longer figure out how to live.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“In a world where even the moon had been traveled, the floor of the Atlantic remained uncharted wilderness, its shipwrecks beacons for men compelled to look.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“If a deep-wreck diver stays in the sport long enough, he will likely either come close to dying, watch another diver die, or die himself. There are times in this sport when it is difficult to say which of the three outcomes is worst.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers

“Not all divers succumb to panic as Drozd did. A great diver learns to stand down his emotions. At the moment he becomes lost or blinded or tangled or trapped, that instant when millions of years of evolution demand fight or flight and narcosis carves order from his brain, he dials down his fear and contracts into the moment until his breathing slows and his narcosis lightens and his reason returns. In this way he overcomes his humanness and becomes something else. In this way, liberated from instincts, he becomes a freak of nature. To”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“He rolled with the unexpected—and much was unexpected on Seeker trips—because he believed in “No matter what.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“To those few, it is not a matter of if they will taste death, only of whether they’ll swallow.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“Excellence is born of preparation, dedication, focus, and tenacity; compromise on any of these and you become average.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“—  If an undertaking was easy, someone else already would have done it. —  If you follow in another’s footsteps, you miss the problems really worth solving. —  Excellence is born of preparation, dedication, focus, and tenacity; compromise on any of these and you become average. —  Every so often, life presents a great moment of decision, an intersection at which a man must decide to stop or go; a person lives with these decisions forever. —  Examine everything; not all is as it seems or as people tell you. —  It is easiest to live with a decision if it is based on an earnest sense of right and wrong.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“and when he sat against trees to catch his breath he marveled at how full life felt when a person got to be excellent,”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“It is easiest to live with a decision if it is based on an earnest sense of right and wrong.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“Fix the first problem fully and calmly before you even think about the second problem.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“He pays attention when a charter captain like Danny Crowell passes around a bucketful of broken dishes and bent silverware and tells his customers, “I want you people to see this stuff. This is what a guy died for. We found it in his bag. Look real hard. Touch it. Are these pieces of shit worth your life?”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“That is one reason why shipwreck divers don’t spend hours working underwater; the decompression time for a two-hour dive might be as long as nine hours.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“It is not that they chose to die, but rather that they could no longer figure out how to live.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“When things are easy a person doesn’t really learn about himself. It’s what a person does at the moment of his greatest struggle that shows him who he really is.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“When things are easy a person doesn’t really learn about himself. It’s what a person does at the moment of his greatest struggle that shows him who he really is. Some people never get that moment.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“In May of that year, forty-one U-boats were destroyed by Allied forces, a disaster that came to be known as “Black May” and which Dönitz described as “unimaginable, even in my wildest dreams.” The “Happy Time” had yielded to Sauregurkenzeit, or “Sour-Pickle Time.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“an undertaking was easy, someone else already would have done it.—If you follow in another’s footsteps, you miss the problems really worth solving.—Excellence is born of preparation, dedication, focus, and tenacity; compromise on any of these and you become average.—Every so often, life presents a great moment of decision, an intersection at which a man must decide to stop or go; a person lives with these decisions forever.—Examine everything; not all is as it seems or as people tell you.—It is easiest to live with a decision if it is based on an earnest sense of right and wrong.—The guy who gets killed is often the guy who got nervous. The guy who doesn’t care anymore, who has said, “I’m already dead—the fact that I live or die is irrelevant and the only thing that matters is the accounting I give of myself,” is the most formidable force in the world.—The worst possible decision is to give up.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“As Nagle spiraled deeper into alcoholism and resentment, Chatterton managed much of his friend’s business, so that the Seeker could remain viable.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“Along the way, each marveled at how easy it was to get an incomplete picture of the world if one relied solely on experts, and how important it would be to further rely on oneself.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“One day Nagle paid him the highest compliment by saying, “When you die no one will ever find your body.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“Excellence is born of preparation, dedication, focus, and tenacity; compromise on any of these and you become average. —  Every so often, life presents a great moment of decision, an intersection at which a man must decide to stop or go; a person lives with these decisions forever. —  Examine everything; not all is as it seems or as people tell you. —  It is easiest to live with a decision if it is based on an earnest sense of right and wrong. —  The guy who gets killed is often the guy who got nervous. The guy who doesn’t care anymore, who has said, “I’m already dead—the fact that I live or die is irrelevant and the only thing that matters is the accounting I give of myself,” is the most formidable force in the world. —  The worst possible decision is to give up.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“If an undertaking was easy, someone else already would have done it. —  If you follow in another’s footsteps, you miss”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II

“Life is a matter of luck, and the odds in favor of success are in no way enhanced by extreme caution.
— WWII German U-Boat Commander Eric Topp”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers

“~ If an undertaking was easy, someone else already would have done it.
~ If you follow in another's footsteps, you miss the problems really worth solving.
~ Excellence is born of preparation, dedication, focus, and tenacity; compromise on any of these and you become average.
~ Every so often, life presents a great moment of decision, an intersection at which a man must decide to stop or go; a person lives with these decisions forever.
~ Examine everything; not all is as it seems or as people tell you.
~ It is easiest to live with a decision if it is based on an earnest sense of right and wrong.
~ The guy who gets killed is often the guy who got nervous. The guy who doesn't care any more, who has said, 'I'm already dead -- the fact that I live or die is irrelevant and the only thing that matters is the accounting I give of myself,' is the most formidable force in the world.
~ The worst possible decision is to give up.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers

“~ If an undertaking was easy, someone els already would have done it.
~ If you follow in another's footsteps, you miss the problems really worth solving.
~ Excellence is born of preparation, dedication, focus, and tenacity; compromise on any of these and you become average.
~ Every so often, life presents a great moment of decision, an intersection at which a man must decide to stop or go; a person lives with these decisions forever.
~ Examine everything; not all is as it seems or as people tell you.
~ It is easiest to live with a decision if it is based on an earnest sense of right and wrong.
~ The guy who gets killed is often the guy who got nervous. The guy who doesn't care any more, who has said, "I'm already dead -- the fact that I live or die is irrelevant and the only thing that matters is the accounting I give of myself," is the most formidable force in the world.
~ The worst possible decision is to give up.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers

“A telegraph on display in a diver’s living room, therefore, is much more than a shiny object; it is an announcement. It says, If someone had been to this ship’s wheelhouse before me, he would not have left this telegraph behind.”
― Robert Kurson, Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II