Victor Vescovo Makes Deepest Submarine Dive in History
For the fourth time, the Five Deeps Expedition has successfully dived to the bottom of one of the world’s five oceans. In the world’s deepest diving operational submersible, the 'Limiting Factor', Victor Vescovo and his team completed the fourth mission of the expedition to reach what is commonly known as the deepest point on planet Earth: Challenger Deep within the Mariana Trench. Victor Vescovo set a new deep-diving record with this achievement.
He is also the first human to make multiple dives, solo, to its hadal depths in the DSV Limiting Factor (Triton 36000/2 model submersible) the world’s deepest diving, currently operational submarine. The expedition reached a maximum depth of 10,928 metres / 35,853 feet deep - 16 metres / 52 feet deeper than any previous manned dive.
Previous Dives
The last visit to the bottom of Challenger Deep was made in 2012 by filmmaker and explorer James Cameron, who reached a depth of 10,908 meters on a dive in his submersible, the Deepsea Challenger. 2 Prior to Cameron’s dive, the first ever dive at Challenger Deep was made by the Trieste, a US Navy deep submergence bathyscaphe, in 1960 to 10,912 meters by Lieutenant Don Walsh and Swiss scientist Jacques Piccard. 3 Both the Trieste and Deepsea Challenger only descended to the bottom of Challenger Deep once.
Four Dives Completed
Between 28 April and 5 May 2019, the Limiting Factor completed four dives to the bottom of Challenger Deep and one final dive on 7 May 2019 to the Sirena Deep which is also in the Mariana Trench, approximately 128 miles to the northeast. Two of the dives, including the deepest one made on 28 April, were solo dives piloted by Vescovo.
Follow the News
In the May/June issue of Hydro International we’ll publish an article about the Five Deeps Expedition. On our website we’ll publish regular updates.
Photo: ©ReeveJolliffe
