Five Deeps Expedition the first to dive in the Tonga Trench Featured
4 June, 2019. The Five Deeps Expedition (an attempt to explore the deepest points in the world’s five oceans) will be the first to explore and dive in the Tonga Trench using a human-occupied submersible called the Limiting Factor.
Expedition Leader Mr Rob McCallum said, “No one has ever done this before. This will be the first time humans have ever been to the Tonga Trench.
Our mission is to go there and put the cameras down and film it, measure it and come back and tell you what you’ve got.”
He said the team has completed four dives.
“The last dive was last month – the challenger deep which is the Marianas Trench and we were on our way to the fifth deep which is up in the Arctic Ocean.
We’re going right past Tonga and Tonga has the second deepest place on earth which is the Tonga Trench, so we thought we’ll come here and dive because we wanted to see how deep it is compared to the challenger.”
“We know it’s very close. So, on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday we’ll be diving there and we’ll know exactly how deep it is.”
McCallum said a government observer from the Geology Department under the Ministry of Lands, Survey and Natural Resources – Assistant Geologist Ms ‘Ana Maea will join them in this mission.
The expedition will depart Nuku’alofa this evening and is expected to arrive at the location of Tonga’s deepest point tomorrow afternoon.
- MEIDECC
