Five Deeps Expeditionachieves world’s first manned decent into the Tonga Trench

DALLAS, TX (June 10, 2019) –The Five Deeps Expedition team makes history again asexplorer Victor Vescovo became the first human to dive on a solo mission to the bottom of the deepest point in the Southern Hemisphere –theTonga Trench’s Horizon Deep. Now measured at 10,823 meters(+/-10meters)or 35,509 feet (+/-33 feet)the expedition definitively confirmed that the Horizon Deep is shallowerthan the Mariana Trench’s Challenger Deep. In addition to the manned dive, the most extensively detailed sonar mapping of the Horizon Deepwas conducted by a KongsbergEM124 multibeam sonar. Over 13,100kilometers2of ocean floor was mapped with a resolution of 75meters.The datacollected will be donated to the GEBCO Seabed2030 initiative.”Less than a month after diving five times to the bottom of the Mariana Trench, we dove the submersible Limiting Factora sixth time below 10,000 meters to continue our exploration of the world’s deep trench systems. There were some lingering doubts if theHorizon Deep might just be deeper than the Challenger Deep, and it is close -only 105 meters shallower -but it is not.”

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