James Cameron Breaks Solo Dive Record
March 26, 2012—In a state-of-the-art submersible, National Geographic explorer-in-residence and filmmaker James Cameron reached the deepest point of the Mariana Trench, breaking a world record for the deepest solo dive.
Transcript
NAT SOT:
National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence James Cameron has finished a record dive to the deepest part of the earth's oceans.
James Cameron, SOT: The Challenger Deep, which is only a small part of the Mariana Trench, is something like 50 times the size of the Grand Canyon. So this is a vast frontier down there that's going to take us a while to understand.
specialized state-of-the-art submersible for the deepest solo-manned dive in history.
James Cameron, SOT: The whole sub actually squeezes down almost three inches in length just because of the pressure. The sphere that I'm in actually shrinks. The window that I look out actually pushes in towards me under 16,000 pounds per square inch of pressure.
Cameron spent more than 3 hours in the lowest point of the Mariana Trench, about 7 miles down, filming and documenting what he saw, and taking samples.
James Cameron, SOT: It was a very lunar, very desolate place, very isolated. My feeling was one of complete isolation from all of humanity. I felt as though literally in the space of one day, I've gone to another planet and come back.
Armed with an 8-foot panel of LED lights and several cameras, Cameron will be able to share with the rest of the world a part of the planet that is virtually unknown.
James Cameron, SOT: any of the animals that live there are adapted to this extreme pressure, this total darkness...they're usually white, they have no pigment...some of them have eyes to see bioluminescence, some of them have no eyes at all...it's a completely alien world.
ameron is the first human to reach the deepest point of the Mariana Trench in more than 50 years.
