This is the longest underwater pipe on Earth.
It stretches to the bottom
of the deepest place on the planet,
where only a few people have ever visited.
And we're about to take you
on an epic journey to construct it.
There is a reason why only a few people
have ever made it to the bottom
of the Mariana Trench.
Let me tell you, it's not the most pleasant of trips.
The deepest part of the trench,
called the Challenger Deep,
hits the mark at 11 km (7 mi).
No light makes it that deep,
and the temperature is just a few degrees above freezing.
If you were to dive down this deep,
with or without a protective suit,
the pressure would crush you.
It would feel as if you had
one hundred elephants standing on your head.
Or, as if you piled five blue whales on your shoulders.
That's what I call being under pressure.
So, how would we go about constructing a pipe
in an environment where no human can survive?
Let's start from the beginning.
Building a pipe like this would require
a lot of planning, preparation,
and millions of dollars.
You'd be aiming for a pipe
that could withstand pressure
one thousand times greater than
our normal atmospheric pressure.
What materials would even stand a chance?
I could suggest steel since that's what
most water pipes are made of.
It's durable and cost-effective.
But transporting 11 km (7 mi) of pipe
into the ocean as one piece
would be next to impossible.
You might be better off with polyester or vinyl resin pipe.
You could reinforce it with fiberglass,
and assemble it underwater.
When you get to a depth that would crush the fiberglass,
you could add some steel.
That's the plan.
Now, let's see how it would play out.
As you descended 200 m (660 ft) underwater,
you'd leave the Epipelagic Zone,
and find yourself in the Mesopelagic Zone.
Those are the top two of five oceanic layers.
Your lungs would be getting compressed
as you descended deeper and deeper.
But it would still be doable at this point,
as long as you were wearing a pressure suit.
It would be dark, but you'd see twinkling lights
once your eyes adjusted to the darkness.
Those would be the bioluminescent animals
that call the Mesopelagic Zone their home.
At 1,000 m (3,300 ft), you'd enter
the Bathypelagic Zone of the ocean.
And you'd better get into a submarine,
because no pressure suit would be able
to keep you from getting crushed now.
From this point on, underwater robots would take over
the construction and maintenance.
The pipe itself would need to be getting thicker
so that it could bear the increasing water pressure.
And you'd need a powerful flashlight.
Because the only visible light down there
is produced by creatures themselves.
You'd descend deeper, and hit the 4,000 m (13,000 ft) mark.
At this point, you'd enter the Abyssopelagic Zone.
Now you'd truly see what dark looks like.
No light at all can make it down to the Abyssopelagic territory.
And the water temperature is near freezing,
so very few animals live here.
You'd be lucky to see a few tiny squid.
You're in the home stretch now,
in the waters of the Hadalpelagic Zone.
In the deepest, the darkest,
the most unexplored place on Earth.
I wouldn't recommend you descend all the way down.
At the bottom of the Mariana Trench,
the pressure is about 1,100 atm.
That's the feeling of one hundred elephants
standing on your head.
Building a pipe here would be challenging.
You’d need to send some very durable robots
to the bottom of the trench,
because these depths can implode even the toughest of them.
On top of enduring extremely high pressure,
they'd have to be able to withstand the temperatures
of just above freezing.
Nothing larger than 3 cm (1 inch)
can live in this dark, cold, and absolutely hostile environment.
So get cozy and let the robots finish the pipe.
And while you up there controlling the robots,
watch out for those
megs.
But that's a story for another WHAT IF.
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