along its axis through which the housing running tool 22 is inserted the shell 24 upper section 56 includes a lower surface 60 shown resting on the wedge assembly 26 upper surface the lower surface 60 is angled to correspond to the increasing wedge 50 thickness and may also include ridges or slots for aligning the wedges 50 more specifically in the embodiment of fig1 the lower surface 60 tapers downward toward the high pressure housing 28 with increasing radius thereby increasing the upper section 56 thickness as shown a latch assembly 62 is provided on walls 39 58 lower terminal end the latch assembly 62 is formed to engage a raised shoulder 64 on the low pressure housing 38 outer circumference latch assembly 62 may be a split ring that snaps inward as it engages recess 64 other latching means exist for selectively coupling the shell 24 to the low pressure housing 38 examples include a c ring collet fingers and an interference press fit to name but a few in one embodiment of use of the bootstrap assembly 20 disclosed herein the assembly 20 is latched to the high pressure housing 28 on a floating platform above the sea in this example the low pressure housing 38 has been landed on the seafloor over a wellbore bored through the seafloor the assembly 20 with its downwardly depending drill pipe 36 and attached high pressure housing 28 is lowered subsea toward the wellbore for mating with the low pressure housing 38 in one embodiment the upper drill pipe 46 provides the lowering means accordingly in this configuration the dogs 32 of the dog latch assembly 30 are engaged with the profile 34 on the high pressure housing 28 the wedge assembly 26 is retained between the upper end.