Diver breaks record with deepest submarine voyage ever recorded, finds discarded plastic. / CBS
It was the voyage to break the record for the world's deepest ocean dive.
But at the bottom of the Mariana Trench in the Pacific, in among the discovery of new sea creatures and other marine life, Victor Vescovo came across something far more surprising — and concerning — during his four-hour excursion, reports news.com.au.
At the bottom of the 11km trench sat small piles of rubbish and lolly wrappers. Humanity's waste had reached the deepest parts of the sea floor.
Mr Vescovo journeyed 10,927 metres to the bottom of the Challenger Deep as part of a mission to explore the world's deepest underwater places.
Images from the fourth of The Five Deeps dive to Challenger Deep in the Pacific Ocean. Photo / Discovery Channel
His voyage took place in a submarine called The Limiting Factor, which is how Mr Vescovo is able to explore some of the most remote places on the planet.
One of the key objectives of the mission — along with discovering new sea creatures — is to create surveys of the undiscovered trenches below.
In an interview with CNN, the American diver said his team were going to perform tests on the creatures to determine the percentage of plastics found in them.
"I crisscrossed all over the bottom looking for different wildlife, potentially unique geological formations or rocks, man-made objects, and, yes, trying to see if there was an even deeper location than where the Trieste went all the way back in 1960," Mr Vescovo said, noting some of the marine life discovered included "vibrantly colourful" rocky outcrops that could be chemical deposits, prawn-like supergiant amphipods, and bottom-dwelling Holothurians, or sea cucumbers.
In among the prawn-like creatures, diver Victor Vescovo also found pollution. Photo / Discovery Channel
According to CBS, the first deep dive into the Mariana Trench was in 1960, when US Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh and Swiss engineer Jacques Piccard ventured into the deep abyss of the Pacific Ocean. In 2012, movie director James Cameron made a solo trip into the Mariana Trench, however Mr Vescovo's team broke Cameron's previous records by about 11 metres.
But the journey isn't as simple as it sounds. According to the BBC, the pressure at the bottom of the ocean is equal to about 50 jumbo jets piled on top of a person.
"It is almost indescribable how excited all of us are about achieving what we just did," Mr Vescovo told BBC News.
The Five Deeps dive to Challenger Deep in the Pacific Ocean broke a new record. Photo / Discovery Channel
"This submarine and its mother ship, along with its extraordinarily talented expedition team, took marine technology to a ridiculously higher new level by diving — rapidly and repeatedly — into the deepest, harshest, area of the ocean."
Mr Vescovo's latest dive is part of the "Five Deeps expedition", where he is attempting to explore the deepest parts of all five oceans.
