DEEP OCEAN EXPLORATION WITH VESCOVO SUBS

?????In 1960, Jon Walsh and Jacques Piccard became the first people to reach the ocean floor and managed to reach a depth of more than 35,000 feet in the Trieste submarine during a US Navy research. Moreover, in 2012, James Cameron, the famous director managed to become the second person to visit challenger deep. However, both of these submarines (Trieste and Cameron) were damaged during the expedition and were unable to make repeated trips.

?????????A private equity investor named Victor Vescovo groundbreaking a vessel made by Florida-based Triton Submersibles that made it to the ocean floor and was repeatedly the first to reach great depths. Vescovo managed to go to “challenger deep” 15 times and was the first person to reach the point deepest in every sea and visit the deepest shipwreck site in the world. These Vescovo submarines are known as Model T Ford of Hadal submarines. Many people have visited the trenches as tourists as well as some who are doing scientific experiments with expedition specialists contributing a $750,000 mission to dive to the bottom of the Pacific. Tourists can explore the site of the Titanic at nearly 2.5 miles underwater in the North Atlantic with the OceanGate expedition. The company has brought more than 30 visitors from Newfoundland to the ship's site over the past two years and has already accepted 2023 reservations at a cost of $250,000 per person for an eight-day adventure offer. The cost of this trip supported scientists and researchers in documenting the Titanic wreck and successfully capturing the first 8K video of the Titanic site, the first documented deep-sea reefs, and other shipwrecks. In addition, on this expedition scientists and researchers managed to collect data on environmental DNA and growth rates of coral growth for future analysis. Not only that, for those interested in reduced-time deep-sea exploration, OceanGate is also offering a one-day dive in Grand Bahama for $45,000 while supporting the University of the Bahama's research in deep-sea basins in 2023 and 2024.

References

Gillespie, A., Vermillion, S., Pennington, E., Pearson, S., & Rogala, B. (2022, November 2). Wanted: Explorers for outer-space and deep-sea tourism. sense of adventure optional. deep pockets a must. Outside Online. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from https://www.outsideonline.com/adventure-travel/news-analysis/space-travel-deep-sea-tourism/?

Writer : Salsabila Hana Zyria Tanjung