James Cameron: “It’s a heck of a ride, you’re just screaming down and screaming back up”
Hollywood director James Cameron has returned to the surface after plunging nearly 11km (seven miles) down to the deepest place in the ocean, the Mariana Trench in the western Pacific.
He made the solo descent in a submarine called “Deepsea Challenger”, taking over two hours to reach the bottom.
He spent more than three hours exploring the ocean floor, before a speedy ascent back to the surface.
His craft was kitted out with cameras and lights so he could film the deep.
This is only the second manned expedition to the ocean’s deepest depths – the first took place in 1960.
The earlier descent was made by US Navy Lt Don Walsh and Swiss oceanographer Jacques Piccard.
They spent about 20 minutes on the ocean floor but their landing kicked up silt, meaning their view was obscured.
Director James Cameron resurfaced after spending nearly three hours on the ocean floor
Before the dive, the Titanic director told the BBC that making the descent was “the fulfilment of a dream”.
He said: “I grew up on a steady diet of science fiction at a time when people were living a science fiction reality.
“People were going to the Moon, and Cousteau was exploring the ocean. And that’s what I grew up with, what I valued from my childhood.”
Deep ambition
Cameron’s last words before his descent were: “Release, release, release.”
The Deepsea Challenger was made in Australia.
Cameron spent the last few years working in secret with his team of engineers to design and build the craft, which weighs 11 tonnes and is more than 7m (23ft) long.
He describes it as a “vertical torpedo” that slices through the water allowing him a speedy descent.
The tiny compartment that the filmmaker sits in is made from thick steel, which is able to resist the 1,000 atmospheres of pressure he will experience at full ocean depth.
The rest of the vertical column is made from a material called syntactic foam – a solid made mostly of hollow “microballoons” – giving it enough buoyancy to float back up.
The sub has so many lights and cameras that it is like an underwater TV studio – with Mr Cameron able to direct and film the action from within. He intends to release a documentary.
It also has robotic arms, allowing him to collect samples of rocks and soils, and a team of researchers are working alongside the director to identify any new species. He says that science is key to his mission.
Mr Cameron’s multi-million-dollar expedition, which has been financed by the filmmaker himself, Rolex and National Geographic, is the first manned effort to the deep for half a century.
In 1960, former US navy lieutenant Don Walsh and Swiss oceanographer Jacques Piccard made the first historic dive in a bathyscaphe called the Trieste.
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Don Walsh, who is now in his 80s, joined Mr Cameron and his team of engineers out at sea for the dive.
He said that getting to the deepest ocean was not so much a feat of engineering, but rather more one of imagination.
Before the dive, he told the BBC: “He (James Cameron) is a storyteller, and going back after 50 years is a great story.
Before he set off for the Mariana trench, James Cameron told the BBC’s Rebecca Morelle why he was risking it all to make the dive
“I thought it was a made-in-heaven match: his interest as a storyteller, his competence as an engineer, he has access to resources, sponsors and such, and made this all come together.
“It probably couldn’t have been easily done by any combination. It’s like the stars were in alignment, it all worked out.”
Scientific riches
While manned exploration had until now seen a 52-year hiatus, scientists have used two robotic unmanned vehicles to explore the Mariana Trench: Japan’s Kaiko made a dive there in 1995 and the US-based Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution’s vessel Nereus explored the deep in 2008.
Other teams, such as Scotland’s Oceanlab, have also been dropping simple landers loaded with bait and cameras into the deepest ocean.
While places like the Mariana Trench were once thought to be of little interest, there has been a recent resurgence of scientific interest in the deep.
Scientists are finding life that can resist the colossal pressures, from deep-sea fish to shrimp-like scavengers called amphipods, some of which can reach 30cm (1ft) long.
They are also trying to understand the role that deep seas trenches play in earthquakes – these cracks in the sea floor are formed at the boundary of two tectonic plates and some believe the push and pull taking place deep underwater could be the cause of major earthquakes, such as the 2011 quake that resulted in such devastation in Japan.
But some scientists question whether manned exploration provides the best platform for scientific research.
Dr Alan Jamieson, from Oceanlab, said: “I think what James Cameron has done is a really good achievement in terms of human endeavour and technology.
“But my feeling is that manned submersibles like this are limited in scientific capabilities when compared to other systems, mostly due to the fact there is someone in it. Remote or autonomous systems can collect a far greater volume of useful scientific data for far less money.”
Opening up oceans
Mr Cameron says he does not want this dive to the deep to be a one-off, and wants to use it as a platform for ocean exploration.
Engineer David Wotherspoon explains how Deepsea Challenger works
His craft may also soon be joined by other manned submersibles vying to reach the ocean’s deepest depths.
One of these crafts, the DeepFlight Challenger, belongs to former real estate investor Chris Welsh, and is backed by Virgin’s Richard Branson. It is about to begin its water trials.
Its design is based on a plane, and Mr Welsh says he will be “flying” down to the deepest ocean.
Google’s Eric Schmidt has helped to finance another sub being built by a US marine technology company called Doer Marine. They want this sub to carry two to three people, and are placing a heavy emphasis on science.
And Triton submarines, a Florida-based submersible company, intends to build a sub with a giant glass sphere at its centrepiece to take tourists down to the deepest ocean for $250,000 a ticket.