James Cameron and a 24 foot vertical torpedo

He is an award winning filmmaker with a penchant for technological perfection. So much so that for Avatar, he took 20 years to conceive the utopian planet Pandora and create the 3D “swing camera” which was first used in that film.

He is also known to be a diving enthusiast. 

So this time around James Cameron in association with National Geographic has designed a 24 foot vertical torpedo. The entire project has taken 8 long years in the making. The intention - to take a 7 mile long vertical dive into the deepest part  of the Mariana Trench - the deepest part of the Pacific Ocean. Deeper than the height of Mount Everest.

So we are talking about a physics major turned truck driver, turned Oscar winning film-maker who has designed a 24 feet torpedo submersible  to take a 36,000 plus feet dive, all alone, strapped in the cockpit of a machine he has built himself.

All this - just to find out what actually is there and to film it.

To make it clear at  the bottom of the trench, where the plates meet, the water column above will exert a pressure of 1,086 bars (15,750 psi), over one thousand times the standard atmospheric pressure at sea level.  That means his 4000lb sub will have over 4,344,000 lb of ocean crushing in on it. If it withstands being crushed then that alone is a wonder of technology. 

The sheer audacity of the idea is mind blowing.

Welcome to Project Challenger Deep.