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fridays are
awesome i m carl azuz and today's
special edition of cnn 10
takes us in depth because you really
can't go
anywhere more in depth than the
challenger deep
the deepest point of the world's deepest
trench in the world's deepest ocean
we're talking about the mariana trench
in the pacific ocean
national geographic describes it as a
scar in the earth's crust
it's located about seven miles beneath
the waves the trench measures more than
1500 miles long and it's 43 miles wide
on average so we're talking about a
pretty big scar overall
and the challenger deep is near the
southern end of it it takes a feat of
engineering just to get there
it takes hours of diving to hit bottom
and it's largely an
unexplored frontier even though
thousands of people have reached the top
of the world on mount everest
fewer than 25 have reached the bottom of
it in the challenger deep
new zealander rob mccallum is one of
them on april 8th
he became the first person from his
country to go there and he went along
with tim mcdonald the first person from
australia to complete the feat
they sent us this video and everything
else you're about to see
and i had the opportunity to interview
mr mccallum about the experience not
long after hehit rock bottom and then resurfaced
again last month let's dive in
it's the last uh unexplored frontier
on earth we know very little
about this this region what we call the
hadel zone
which is that area of the ocean below 6
000 meters or 20 000 feet
you can't just get there in a normal
submarine what sort of vehicle does it
take to withstand the pressures there
that's a very interesting question
because pressure is
entirely relative when a spacecraft goes
up into space
they're only experiencing a pressure
change of one atmosphere
between the inside of the spacecraft and
the outside
we are dealing with a pressure
differential of around 1100 atmospheres
so we dive in a titanium sphere
which is able to withstand 100
000 tons of pressure just
on the hatch through which we get into
the submarine just the hatch alone has
2200 tons
or around five fully laden boeing 747
squishing down on it
that's that's incredible i mean somebody
can't go out and buy that how does one
acquire a vehicle like that
this vehicle was made for this specific
purpose
it was designed and built by triton
submarines in florida
specifically to be able to voyage down
through
seven and a half miles of water column
to get to the bottom and that's why it's
got kind of an interesting shape
it looks like a pillow that's on its
side and that's so that it can drop
down through the water column very very
quickly
you said very quickly how long does it
take to get to that depth
it takes around four and a half hours to
get to the deepest point of the world's
ocean
we go down through the water at about
six feet per second
and coming back uh we release ballast
weight on the bottom to
uh to just spring us off the bottom and
head for the surface
and so it's about a three and a half
hour ride home
what are you seeing when you get to the
ocean floor in the deepest part of it
this is the most fantastic part of what
we're doing it's true exploration
you know we never know what we're going
to see every dive has yielded something
fascinating
often something new to science we are
seeing
creatures for the first time we are
discovering entire landscapes which were
previously unknown
that's still a full day just in travel
time so how much time does that
give you on the ocean's floor
we try to uh stay down for three to five
hours on the bottom
you know it's a big investment of time
and energy it takes the entire team to
get this vehicle prepared and get it
downand so we try to use every minute
possible on the bottom
our submersible has three viewports one
for each of the occupants but also one
central one that allows us to see down
to the sea floor
but we're also surrounded by uh very
high definition cameras that are all
linked to a screen in front of us
and we can look in any direction outside
and that's important because we don't
really know where we're going we're
almost always the very first humans that
have ever been there
and so although we have a
three-dimensional map that we've made
the day before we need a very good
view outside to see what's coming
you know for humans we don't really fear
what we can't
sense and so when you're in an airliner
and you're looking out
you don't naturally think of the wind
going past it's 500 miles an hour and
it's minus 50 out there and there's not
enough air to breathe you just if i can
see a town or i can see a truck
and the same in the sun there's no
sensation of movement there's no
sensation of sound
you can't hear or feel anything from
outside it's just a very peaceful
relaxing cruise
into the unknown
i think that we know so little about
the ocean that we barely understand what
questions to ask let alone
um have the ability to to understand the
answers
my role and the role of of the team that
i work with
is to simply open the door this is the
first vehicle in all of human history
that has the ability to reach the deep
ocean
uh in any ocean at any depth at any time
it's it's it's a akin to the wright
brothers with the first flying machine
this is just the first baby steps
i know the technology might be a way
away from creating a sort of ocean
exploration station that can withstand
depths like that but we have reported on
there there is more funding and
investment in underwater exploration
stations i mean
how important would you feel those would
be as contrasted with let's say the
international space station
both are important don't get me wrong
i'm not taking a shot at space travel
but you knowspace is a vast void a vacuum
that so far has proved to be lifeless
the ocean is nothing like that the ocean
isfull of life you know right from the
surface all the way down to the very
very bottom
i think before we leave home and start
exploring the heavens we should at least
explore our own backyard more thoroughly
i think that many of the answers to our
collective future
are going to be found in the ocean and
some of those in the deep ocean
the answers to how we're going to handle
all the carbon in the atmosphere
the answers to the dynamics of our ocean
and how we can arrest
the decline of the ocean but also the
things that we might discover in terms
of
valuable compounds for medicines and
that sort of thing
so why do you think there's so much
interest in space exploration when we
could be exploring what we have right
here
i think it's as simple as when we gaze
upat the heavens we uh we have a sense of
wonder
uh what's out there you know what can we
find
we always look skyward because we're
terrestrial mammals we we
look up to the heavens when we look into
the water
we don't really see that much we see an
opaque
plant plane a platform that we can pull
fish out of
maybe go for a swimming but we don't
actually go
too far down you know my dive was about
36
000 feet most humans never get below
about 300 feet
so there's a long way to go yet
so it appears we've barely scratched the
surface and there are still so many
questions in limbo except how low you
can go because we know
from those who've plumped the depths and
helped us both
deepen and reach new heights of
understanding doherty valley high school
shout out to you
our viewers in san ramon california we
haveone week on the air left in our spring
broadcasting season so we hope to see
you again monday
i m carl azuz for cnn
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