Exploring the Mariana Trench Mysteries

From mysterious sounds to unidentified monsters, here is why we don't know much at all about the deepest place on Earth! 10. The Mariana Trench Deepest Depths The Mariana Trench is the deepest place on Earth. The enormous trench is shaped like a crescent and located in the western Pacific, very near the Mariana Islands, hence the name. Not only does the Mariana Trench contain the deepest point on Earth, but it also contains several of the deepest points known to mankind. There are mud volcanoes inside, strange creatures we've yet to meet, and pressures that are 1,000 times what you get at sea level. The reason we don't know much about the Mariana Trench is because of how deep it is. At the southern end of the trench is Challenger Deep, the lowest spot in the ocean. The best estimates we have say that Challenger Deep is 36,070 feet. This measurement comes from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, who use special sound pulses to properly measure its depth. The second deepest place in the world is also located inside the Mariana Trench. It's known as Sirena Deep, and it's a blistering 35,462 feet deep. It's also located about 124 miles east of Challenger Deep. To give you a comparison of just how deep the Mariana Trench is, if you took Mount Everest and flipped it upside down, there would still be 7,044 feet to go before you reach the bottom. Skydivers jump out of airplanes at about 7,000 feet, meaning the Mariana Trench is as deep as Everest is tall, plus the distance of skydiving from the clouds to the ground. 9. Horrifying Creatures The Mariana Trench is so massive that we simply don't know what's down there. After you descend 3,000 feet into the ocean, there is absolutely no sunlight to witness life forms. The few creatures we have discovered living in the trench are absolutely horrifying. Plus, scientists say we have barely scratched the surface of life in this great ocean gulf. Still, we can get a pretty good idea of just what kind of goblins are living in the Mariana Trench by looking at the creatures we've already discovered. First on the list is the Dumbo Octopus. A cute yet bizarre octopus with ears like Dumbo the elephant. This is the deepest-dwelling octopus known to us so far, living at about 13,000 feet deep. Cute right? Then we have the deep-sea dragonfish. One of the most horrific animals ever. The dragonfish is an assassin with no scales, and a slippery and slimy skin just like an eel. These monsters live about 6,000 feet deep and rely on bioluminescent body parts to help them hunt. Then we have the barrel-eye fish, something that looks like it belongs in another dimension. The fish is incredibly rare and has a translucent body that allows you to see straight through its skin and into its brain. Researchers have only found a handful of these fish, and they live to see the difference. They live about 2,500 feet deep. Last but not least is the Goblin Shark. This toothy creature looks like somebody blended a shark with an orc from the Lord of the Rings. It has a snout that looks like a sword with protruding jaws and pink skin. Some of them can grow to be as big as 18 feet. They live at least 3,000 feet beneath the surface, diving deeper into the Mariana Trench the older they get. 8. Undersea Volcanoes There are more than monsters in the Mariana Trench. the Mariana Trench. Researchers used a remotely operated vehicle to explore some of the deeper waters of the trench, and much to their surprise, they were able to document a volcanic eruption going on about 2.8 miles below the surface of the ocean. It has been described as the deepest eruption ever recorded on our planet. To give you an idea of just how deep the volcano is, it's located deeper inside the Mariana Trench than Mount Rainier is high above the sea level. Researchers say the eruption happened sometime between 20 and 30 miles below the surface 2013 and 2015. It happened in a zone within the trench called the Back Ark. This is an area on the seafloor with many active volcanoes. Marine geologist Bill Chadwick from Oregon State University recently said in a statement that almost all of the world's volcanic activity does indeed take place under the ocean, with almost none of it being detected by scientists. Submarine eruptions, as they're known, are elusive despite their frequency. This particular eruption was discovered in 2015. by cameras on an ROV. The cameras captured photographs of a dark lava flow spreading across the seafloor. The camera also witnessed hydrothermal vent fluid venting from the lava flow, indicating that the lava was warm and fresh. And this is just another reason why it's so hard to explore the Mariana Trench. The last thing explorers want is to be burned alive by undersea lava. 7. Mysterious Sounds An autonomous vehicle deep inside the Mariana Trench picked up a sound recording so creepy and so terrifying that it would make your hair stand on end. The sound clip is only 3.5 seconds long. It was a mysterious metallic sound coming from deep inside the trench, and it took months and months of research for scientists to finally identify what they feel is the most likely source of the creepy audio. Was it something rumbling deep inside the earth? Scientists now believe that the noise was actually made by an animal, more specifically, a new type of baleen whale. According to Sharon Newkirk from Oregon State University, the low-frequency moan of the whale was very distinct. It was the exact type of moan heard from other baleen whales, but this one was a bit more unique, a little twangy, and never before heard by scientists. This is amazing because to find a new type of whale in the ocean basically never happens anymore. The frequency of the sound spanned a range of between 38 Hz and 8,000 Hz. Sharon and her team of scientists were unable to find any human or geological sources that could have contributed to the noise. It definitely wasn't produced by a ship. ship. The only thing that the sound could have been made by was a whale. So this leads to the question, what other things are deep down in the depths that we've never heard about? And now for some expeditions, but first wanted to give a big shout out to Jamie Salmon and Mr Dizzy Izzy! Thanks so much for joining our corner of the internet! Be sure to subscribe if you haven't already for more videos like these! 6. Expeditions Let's take a look at just how difficult it really is to explore the Mariana Trench. Because of the extreme conditions, there have only been a handful of people that have been able to go into the depths. The first dive into the bottom of the trench was in 1960 by Jacques Piccard, no relation to Star Trek, and Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh. These two men descended using an incredibly expensive United States Navy submersible known as a bathyscape. After years of preparation, the two men descended for five hours into the trench and then spent a paltry 20 minutes sitting at the bottom. They were unable to take. take photographs because they were sitting in a giant cloud of silt stirred up by their vessel. These guys sat there in complete darkness and could do absolutely nothing. The most exciting moment was when an unidentified fish moved in front of their giant floodlights, finally proving to the world that life definitely exists at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, something scientists had been debating before the journey. In 2019, Victor Vescovo became the new record holder when he made it to 10,927 meters below low sea level. In total, Vescovo and his team made five dives to the bottom of the trench during the expedition. A submarine and robotic landers all spread out to explore and gather data of the harshest area of the ocean. Don Walsh from the 1960s expedition congratulated Victor for his historic exploration. They discovered new species and collected samples of microorganisms and rock samples. Prior to that, in 2012, James Cameron had made a solo plunge in a bright green sub, going down nearly 11 kilometers. Billionaire investors are spending more and more on science and marine technology to try to continue going down into the trench, and are even working on building submarines to take turns. tourists down to the deepest part of the ocean for $250,000 a ticket. Would you visit the trench if you could? Maybe not for $250,000, but maybe in the future if the price goes down? Let me know in the comments below! 5. A Lot of Pressure The pressure at the very bottom of the Mariana Trench is enough to crush a person into a pancake. The pressure would be equivalent to about 100 adult elephants standing directly on your head. If you've ever wondered why exactly the pressure gets so intense when you go underwater, it's because the weight of all that water is literally pushing down upon you. If you were to stand at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, there would be 7 miles of water on top of you. That's 7 miles of concentrated water pressing down on your skin and bones, and there's just no way your body can handle it. It's almost like being in outer space, the environment is just so different. The weight of water creates hydrostatic pressure. Of the Mariana Trench, the pressure is so great that scientists believe it affects life in all kinds of strange ways, such as distorting the complex structures of biomolecules. These are DNA, proteins, and membranes. Because these biomolecules are distorted by the pressure, life adapts in a very strange way, creating squishy, weird animals. One of those animals is the gelatinous trench snailfish, living around 25,000 feet deep. Another extremely dark, gooey creatures. some with teeth, some with biol- 4. Undiscovered Monsters There have been some rumors flying around that giant undiscovered monsters are living in the Mariana Trench. Since there are sounds and animals, the sound of But if we look at the fossils we are just now learning about, could there be some enormous monster like a Kraken, or even a living Megalodon hiding out in the deepest undersea gorge? The answer is maybe. Perhaps not a Megalodon, but maybe something else. We know today that the Megalodon is a very rare species. It is known as the Cretaceous, and is known for its large, long, and long-lived body. It is also known as the Cretaceous, and is known for its large, We know today that life is abundant inside the trench. Missions using unmanned vehicles have discovered strange creatures living on the sea floor in the deepest parts of the ocean. Some of these animals are gigantic, products of what is known as deep-sea gigantism. Giant isopods, for example. These crustaceans look exactly like the pill bugs you find in your garden, the only difference is that the giant isopod is roughly 2 feet long, if not longer. Then we have giant colossal squids to consider, which are far more than just giant. They are larger than common squids and live in the deepest parts of the ocean. Following this trend, it's safe to say that something big, or even giant may be living in the Mariana Trench. We just haven't encountered it yet. However, megalodons went extinct a very long time ago and they fed on blubberous mammals like seals and whales that breathe air, so we should have seen one by now. But perhaps there is another kind of mega shark lurking that we can't even imagine. 3. The Formation of the Trench To understand a bit more about how hard it is to explore the Mariana Trench, we should look at just how this amazing geological feature was formed. The trench was created by a process known as subduction. The crust of the earth is made of plates which float on the molten rock of the mantle. Because these plates are floating on the mantle, their edges sometimes bump into one another and cause things like earthquakes and tsunamis. When two of these plates crash into one another, one of the plates is destroyed. One plate is pulled down, creating an enormous trench at the point of contact. This is how the Mariana Trench was formed. It's the meeting place where two plates collided. Of course, these plates are huge. The Mariana Trench is not only deep, it's long too. It goes on for about 1500 miles and is 43 miles wide. It's also roughly 180 million years old. But what you might not believe is that the Mariana Trench is not the closest point to the center of the Earth. Earth, even though it is the deepest place on Earth. You would actually be closer to the center of the planet if you were standing on the surface of the Arctic Ocean at the geographic North Pole. 2. The Deepest Trash Even though the Mariana Trench is so deep, so limitless, and so mysterious, it has not been spared the horrors of humanity. A recent and disturbing report from National Geographic confirmed that a piece of trash a plastic bag, specifically was found at the deepest point of the Arctic Ocean. point in the ocean. This plastic bag is now recognized as the deepest piece of litter in the world. It was found at an exact depth of 36,000 feet. Scientists working with the Deep Sea Debris Database have been checking out a collection of photographs taken over the past 30 years, and what they found is that the most prevalent debris in the ocean is throwaway plastic, meaning shopping bags and plastic water bottles, about 89% in total. A separate study recently suggested that the most prevalent debris in the ocean is the The Mariana Trench shows higher levels of pollution in certain areas than many of the most polluted rivers found throughout Asia. The thinking behind the theory is that chemical pollutants enter the trench from many other places in the ocean, brought in on the water column. Some fear that by the time we're actually able to explore the Mariana Trench in its fullness, the whole thing will be a polluted pit of death. 1. Future Exploration There is still a lot of interest in exploring the Mariana Trench. It's just that most people doing it happen to be rich philanthropists, like I told you about. A man named Larry Connor is scheduled to make two dives into the Mariana Trench in April 2021. According to USA Today, Larry Connor will be diving to a depth of more than 35,000 feet. He plans on visiting Challenger Deep and Sirena Deep, both in the region. of which are in the Mariana Trench. These dives will be happening in mid-April of 2021, so keep your eyes open for any new discoveries. The crew will be spending about four hours at the bottom of the trench conducting scientific research. Larry is using the Hadassah doll exploration system for his dives, the only deep exploration facility in the whole world. He will also be accompanied by Patrick Leahy, considered to be the most experienced submersible pilot in the world. And as if going to the two deepest points on Earth wasn't enough, Larry is also scheduled for a mission to the International Space Station in 2022. That will make Larry the only person to travel from the deepest point on Earth to outer space. No easy feat. What do you think is lurking at the bottom of the trench? Let me know in the comments below and be sure to hit that subscribe button if you haven't already! See you soon! Bye!

The reason we don't know much about the Mariana Trench is because of how deep it is. At the southern end of the trench is Challenger Deep, the lowest spot in the ocean. The best estimates we have say that Challenger Deep is 36,070 feet. This measurement comes from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, who use special sound pulses to properly measure its depth.

The second deepest place in the world is also located inside the Mariana Trench. It's known as Sirena Deep, and it's a blistering 35,462 feet deep. It's also located about 124 miles east of Challenger Deep. To give you a comparison of just how deep the Mariana Trench is, if you took Mount Everest and flipped it upside down, there would still be 7,044 feet to go before you reach the bottom. Skydivers jump out of airplanes at about 7,000 feet, meaning the Mariana Trench is as deep as Everest is tall, plus the distance of skydiving from the clouds to the ground.

9. Horrifying Creatures The Mariana Trench is so massive that we simply don't know what's down there. After you descend 3,000 feet into the ocean, there is absolutely no sunlight to witness life forms. The few creatures we have discovered living in the trench are absolutely horrifying.

Plus, scientists say we have barely scratched the surface of life in this great ocean gulf. Still, we can get a pretty good idea of just what kind of goblins are living in the Mariana Trench by looking at the creatures we've already discovered. First on the list is the Dumbo Octopus. A cute yet bizarre octopus with ears like Dumbo the elephant.

This is the deepest-dwelling octopus known to us so far, living at about 13,000 feet deep. Cute right? Then we have the deep-sea dragonfish. One of the most horrific animals ever. The dragonfish is an assassin with no scales, and a slippery and slimy skin just like an eel.

These monsters live about 6,000 feet deep and rely on bioluminescent body parts to help them hunt. Then we have the barrel-eye fish, something that looks like it belongs in another dimension. The fish is incredibly rare and has a translucent body that allows you to see straight through its skin and into its brain. Researchers have only found a handful of these fish, and they live to see the difference. They live about 2,500 feet deep.

Last but not least is the Goblin Shark. This toothy creature looks like somebody blended a shark with an orc from the Lord of the Rings. It has a snout that looks like a sword with protruding jaws and pink skin.

Some of them can grow to be as big as 18 feet. They live at least 3,000 feet beneath the surface, diving deeper into the Mariana Trench the older they get. 8. Undersea Volcanoes There are more than monsters in the Mariana Trench.

the Mariana Trench. Researchers used a remotely operated vehicle to explore some of the deeper waters of the trench, and much to their surprise, they were able to document a volcanic eruption going on about 2.8 miles below the surface of the ocean. It has been described as the deepest eruption ever recorded on our planet.

To give you an idea of just how deep the volcano is, it's located deeper inside the Mariana Trench than Mount Rainier is high above the sea level. Researchers say the eruption happened sometime between 20 and 30 miles below the surface 2013 and 2015. It happened in a zone within the trench called the Back Ark. This is an area on the seafloor with many active volcanoes. Marine geologist Bill Chadwick from Oregon State University recently said in a statement that almost all of the world's volcanic activity does indeed take place under the ocean, with almost none of it being detected by scientists.

Submarine eruptions, as they're known, are elusive despite their frequency. This particular eruption was discovered in 2015. by cameras on an ROV. The cameras captured photographs of a dark lava flow spreading across the seafloor. The camera also witnessed hydrothermal vent fluid venting from the lava flow, indicating that the lava was warm and fresh. And this is just another reason why it's so hard to explore the Mariana Trench.

The last thing explorers want is to be burned alive by undersea lava. 7. Mysterious Sounds An autonomous vehicle deep inside the Mariana Trench picked up a sound recording so creepy and so terrifying that it would make your hair stand on end. The sound clip is only 3.5 seconds long.

It was a mysterious metallic sound coming from deep inside the trench, and it took months and months of research for scientists to finally identify what they feel is the most likely source of the creepy audio. Was it something rumbling deep inside the earth? Scientists now believe that the noise was actually made by an animal, more specifically, a new type of baleen whale. According to Sharon Newkirk from Oregon State University, the low-frequency moan of the whale was very distinct. It was the exact type of moan heard from other baleen whales, but this one was a bit more unique, a little twangy, and never before heard by scientists.

This is amazing because to find a new type of whale in the ocean basically never happens anymore. The frequency of the sound spanned a range of between 38 Hz and 8,000 Hz. Sharon and her team of scientists were unable to find any human or geological sources that could have contributed to the noise.

It definitely wasn't produced by a ship. ship. The only thing that the sound could have been made by was a whale. So this leads to the question, what other things are deep down in the depths that we've never heard about?

And now for some expeditions, but first wanted to give a big shout out to Jamie Salmon and Mr Dizzy Izzy! Thanks so much for joining our corner of the internet! Be sure to subscribe if you haven't already for more videos like these! 6. Expeditions Let's take a look at just how difficult it really is to explore the Mariana Trench. Because of the extreme conditions, there have only been a handful of people that have been able to go into the depths.

The first dive into the bottom of the trench was in 1960 by Jacques Piccard, no relation to Star Trek, and Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh. These two men descended using an incredibly expensive United States Navy submersible known as a bathyscape. After years of preparation, the two men descended for five hours into the trench and then spent a paltry 20 minutes sitting at the bottom.

They were unable to take. take photographs because they were sitting in a giant cloud of silt stirred up by their vessel. These guys sat there in complete darkness and could do absolutely nothing.

The most exciting moment was when an unidentified fish moved in front of their giant floodlights, finally proving to the world that life definitely exists at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, something scientists had been debating before the journey. In 2019, Victor Vescovo became the new record holder when he made it to 10,927 meters below low sea level. In total, Vescovo and his team made five dives to the bottom of the trench during the expedition. A submarine and robotic landers all spread out to explore and gather data of the harshest area of the ocean.

Don Walsh from the 1960s expedition congratulated Victor for his historic exploration. They discovered new species and collected samples of microorganisms and rock samples. Prior to that, in 2012, James Cameron had made a solo plunge in a bright green sub, going down nearly 11 kilometers.

Billionaire investors are spending more and more on science and marine technology to try to continue going down into the trench, and are even working on building submarines to take turns. tourists down to the deepest part of the ocean for $250,000 a ticket. Would you visit the trench if you could?

Maybe not for $250,000, but maybe in the future if the price goes down? Let me know in the comments below! 5. A Lot of Pressure The pressure at the very bottom of the Mariana Trench is enough to crush a person into a pancake.

The pressure would be equivalent to about 100 adult elephants standing directly on your head. If you've ever wondered why exactly the pressure gets so intense when you go underwater, it's because the weight of all that water is literally pushing down upon you. If you were to stand at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, there would be 7 miles of water on top of you.

That's 7 miles of concentrated water pressing down on your skin and bones, and there's just no way your body can handle it. It's almost like being in outer space, the environment is just so different. The weight of water creates hydrostatic pressure. Of the Mariana Trench, the pressure is so great that scientists believe it affects life in all kinds of strange ways, such as distorting the complex structures of biomolecules.

These are DNA, proteins, and membranes. Because these biomolecules are distorted by the pressure, life adapts in a very strange way, creating squishy, weird animals. One of those animals is the gelatinous trench snailfish, living around 25,000 feet deep. Another extremely dark, gooey creatures. some with teeth, some with biol- 4. Undiscovered Monsters There have been some rumors flying around that giant undiscovered monsters are living in the Mariana Trench.

Since there are sounds and animals, the sound of But if we look at the fossils we are just now learning about, could there be some enormous monster like a Kraken, or even a living Megalodon hiding out in the deepest undersea gorge? The answer is maybe. Perhaps not a Megalodon, but maybe something else.

We know today that the Megalodon is a very rare species. It is known as the Cretaceous, and is known for its large, long, and long-lived body. It is also known as the Cretaceous, and is known for its large, We know today that life is abundant inside the trench.

Missions using unmanned vehicles have discovered strange creatures living on the sea floor in the deepest parts of the ocean. Some of these animals are gigantic, products of what is known as deep-sea gigantism. Giant isopods, for example.

These crustaceans look exactly like the pill bugs you find in your garden, the only difference is that the giant isopod is roughly 2 feet long, if not longer. Then we have giant colossal squids to consider, which are far more than just giant. They are larger than common squids and live in the deepest parts of the ocean.

Following this trend, it's safe to say that something big, or even giant may be living in the Mariana Trench. We just haven't encountered it yet. However, megalodons went extinct a very long time ago and they fed on blubberous mammals like seals and whales that breathe air, so we should have seen one by now.

But perhaps there is another kind of mega shark lurking that we can't even imagine. 3. The Formation of the Trench To understand a bit more about how hard it is to explore the Mariana Trench, we should look at just how this amazing geological feature was formed. The trench was created by a process known as subduction. The crust of the earth is made of plates which float on the molten rock of the mantle. Because these plates are floating on the mantle, their edges sometimes bump into one another and cause things like earthquakes and tsunamis.

When two of these plates crash into one another, one of the plates is destroyed. One plate is pulled down, creating an enormous trench at the point of contact. This is how the Mariana Trench was formed. It's the meeting place where two plates collided. Of course, these plates are huge.

The Mariana Trench is not only deep, it's long too. It goes on for about 1500 miles and is 43 miles wide. It's also roughly 180 million years old. But what you might not believe is that the Mariana Trench is not the closest point to the center of the Earth. Earth, even though it is the deepest place on Earth.

You would actually be closer to the center of the planet if you were standing on the surface of the Arctic Ocean at the geographic North Pole. 2. The Deepest Trash Even though the Mariana Trench is so deep, so limitless, and so mysterious, it has not been spared the horrors of humanity. A recent and disturbing report from National Geographic confirmed that a piece of trash a plastic bag, specifically was found at the deepest point of the Arctic Ocean.

point in the ocean. This plastic bag is now recognized as the deepest piece of litter in the world. It was found at an exact depth of 36,000 feet. Scientists working with the Deep Sea Debris Database have been checking out a collection of photographs taken over the past 30 years, and what they found is that the most prevalent debris in the ocean is throwaway plastic, meaning shopping bags and plastic water bottles, about 89% in total.

A separate study recently suggested that the most prevalent debris in the ocean is the The Mariana Trench shows higher levels of pollution in certain areas than many of the most polluted rivers found throughout Asia. The thinking behind the theory is that chemical pollutants enter the trench from many other places in the ocean, brought in on the water column. Some fear that by the time we're actually able to explore the Mariana Trench in its fullness, the whole thing will be a polluted pit of death.

1. Future Exploration There is still a lot of interest in exploring the Mariana Trench. It's just that most people doing it happen to be rich philanthropists, like I told you about. A man named Larry Connor is scheduled to make two dives into the Mariana Trench in April 2021. According to USA Today, Larry Connor will be diving to a depth of more than 35,000 feet. He plans on visiting Challenger Deep and Sirena Deep, both in the region. of which are in the Mariana Trench.

These dives will be happening in mid-April of 2021, so keep your eyes open for any new discoveries. The crew will be spending about four hours at the bottom of the trench conducting scientific research. Larry is using the Hadassah doll exploration system for his dives, the only deep exploration facility in the whole world. He will also be accompanied by Patrick Leahy, considered to be the most experienced submersible pilot in the world. And as if going to the two deepest points on Earth wasn't enough, Larry is also scheduled for a mission to the International Space Station in 2022. That will make Larry the only person to travel from the deepest point on Earth to outer space.

No easy feat. What do you think is lurking at the bottom of the trench? Let me know in the comments below and be sure to hit that subscribe button if you haven't already! See you soon! Bye!

Transcript for:Exploring the Mariana Trench Mysteries

Transcript for:
Exploring the Mariana Trench Mysteries