SCULLIBUNDO
Banned
UPDATED! 25/03/2012 EST/AUS
This CNN article was just posted and then pulled. Luckily EcoRazzi - the team following Cameron's dives closely, cached it while it was up:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.c...eans-deepest-parts/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
http://www.ecorazzi.com/2012/03/02/james-cameron-is-diving-the-mariana-trench-soon/
More at the links.
So it looks like his final test dives will happen this week, with the dive itself taking place the following week.
I think it is a pretty damn incredible undertaking. I would shit myself at the prospect of that much pressure being exerted on my tiny submersible and being so ridiculously far from help. Any one thing goes wrong and it is instant death alone at the bottom of the ocean? Fuck that.
But then there is also the huge promise of new, never before seen life down there.
Good luck, Jim!
This CNN article was just posted and then pulled. Luckily EcoRazzi - the team following Cameron's dives closely, cached it while it was up:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.c...eans-deepest-parts/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
Editor's note: Watch CNN TV this week for exclusive coverage of James Cameron's final test dives before his attempt to reach the bottom of the Mariana Trench.
At more than 10,900 meters (35,800 feet), the Mariana Trench is deeper than Mount Everest is tall, and has had only two previous human visitors. In 1960, U.S. Navy Lt. Don Walsh and the late Swiss explorer Jacques Piccard descended into the deep in the bathyscaphe Trieste.
Scientists hope that Challenger Deep will provide insight into many unfamiliar life in the depths of the ocean. It is estimated that more than 750,000 marine species have not been formally described in scientific literature over the centuries, triple the number of those that have been. The figures exclude microbes, of which a 2010 census estimates there are up to 1 billion kinds.
Cameron and his team have secretly planned and plotted for five years to send the second manned vessel into the chasm. He has been conducting test deep sea dives inside his one-man submersible for several weeks.
He says he plans to spend six hours in the pitch-black waters on the ocean floor using remote arms to collect samples for research in marine biology, microbiology, astrobiology, marine geology and geophysics. His vehicle is decked out with advanced technology including a 3-D camera that he hopes will capture rare forms of sea life so he can turn his deep dive adventure into a movie.
http://www.ecorazzi.com/2012/03/02/james-cameron-is-diving-the-mariana-trench-soon/
screwing up royally on this kind of adventure means instant death.
“At 35,800 feet there is over 1085 atmospheres of pressure, translating to 16,000 lbs\sq in, or 2.3 million pounds of pressure per square foot,” they wrote. “Hard to believe any man-made submarine could withstand that kind of pressure. Pretty amazing. And I’d say it takes guts to put yourself in that kind of situation. The GOOD news is that, if something DID give at that depth, the implosion would be so fast and total you’d never feel it.”
More at the links.
So it looks like his final test dives will happen this week, with the dive itself taking place the following week.
I think it is a pretty damn incredible undertaking. I would shit myself at the prospect of that much pressure being exerted on my tiny submersible and being so ridiculously far from help. Any one thing goes wrong and it is instant death alone at the bottom of the ocean? Fuck that.
But then there is also the huge promise of new, never before seen life down there.
Good luck, Jim!