It's said that we know more about outer space than we do about our own oceans, and there's
a lot of truth to that statement.
While it's relatively easy to scan the skies with telescopes, or even to put satellites
into orbit that can help us make discoveries about the void outside our planet, getting
research equipment- let alone men- to survive the trek to the bottom of the ocean can be
extremely challenging.
And nowhere is it more challenging than at the deepest point in the ocean, the Mariana
Trench.
But what if you wanted to do more than just visit, what would it take to actually live
there?
Fantasies of escaping the world above for a life beneath the waves are as old as humanity,
though most of our viewers are probably best familiar to the idea through the Bioshock
franchise.
An award winning video game that took place in an underwater utopia that predictably turned
into a chaotic mess of violence and greed.
Still, the idea of living beneath the waves caught the public's imagination, much as 20,000
Leagues Under The Sea had done decades prior.
In real life, many futurists believe that humanity will be able to move into the oceans
far sooner than it will move into the stars.
Some architecture firms have even drawn up plans for floating cities, along with underwater
metropolises which could be made completely self-sufficient.
With most of the world's mineral, oil, and natural gas wealth resting at the bottom of
the ocean, the seas are a vast goldmine waiting to be tapped.
However, even the most ambitious plans to move humanity under the waves stop far short
of going somewhere as deep as the Mariana Trench.
One day you decide that you've had it with humanity, you don't want to see or hear from
another living person ever again.
You check twitter and discover that Elon Musk's one-way trip to Mars is still no sooner to
being a reality, and realize that if you want to get away, you're going to have to go down
and not up.
Really, really down, to the deepest point in the ocean.
At 36,201 feet (11,034 meters), you can't get any deeper than the Mariana Trench.
The trench is so deep in fact that if you were to put Mount Everest inside it there
would still be 1.2 miles (2 km) of water above it.
And if you're worried about living space, well the trench is about 1,580 miles (2,550
km) long and 43 miles (69 km) wide, so there's plenty of elbow room to go around.
Like planning any move your first concern is going to be for shelter, and at the bottom
of the trench you're going to need one hell of a shelter to keep you from being squashed
like an overripe tomato.
That's because the pressure at the bottom of the trench is an incredible 15,750 pounds
per square inch, or about 1,000 times the pressure at sea level.
That's the total weight of all the water pressing down on you from above, and at those pressures
your skull would implode instantly.
To resist all that pressure you're going to need specially constructed habitats that can
withstand incredible stresses, and luckily for you we already have some experience in
building things sturdy enough to keep humans alive in the dark depths.
In 2012 James Cameron took a break from making sequels to his Fern Gully rip-off, we mean
'homage', to fulfill a lifelong goal of descending to the bottom of Challenger Deep, the deepest
part of the Mariana Trench.
To achieve the feat he made the journey inside a cigar shaped submersible, although the actual
crew compartment was a sphere that was only 43 inches wide.
That's because spheres are the strongest shape for resisting pressure as they help to distribute
the pressure load much in the same way as an arch.
While other more traditional shapes are possible with today's engineering, making any other
shape craft would require three or more times the wall thickness.
With walls already several inches thick, your habitat is going to have to be a sphere, so
you'll have to get used to living in what will essentially be a giant hamster ball.
Of course the size of that ball will also be very limited, as increasing the size of
the sphere will exponentially decrease how effectively it spreads out the pressure pushing
down on it.
Realistically, you're going to be living in a sphere that's four to five feet across maximum.
Maybe you're a fan of tight spots though and don't feel particularly claustrophobic- we
certainly hope not because exiting your habitat will be 100% impossible and result in instant
death.
Still, you've sorted out the living situation, and with such tight quarters you'll save a
fortune on furniture!
Food and water are going to be next.
Water seems obvious, as it's all around you and many modern ships employ desalination
systems to turn salty sea water into fresh water.
Except it's not really going to be as easy as it seems, because physically getting the
water from outside to inside your habitat is going to be an extremely difficult thing
to do.
That's because the immense pressure is constantly pushing down, so the moment you turn on a
tap to take water in, you're going to have the entire ocean trying to rush through your
pipes.
Taking water in from the outside is a no-go, so you're going to have to do like astronauts
and recycle the water you bring with you.
This means sweat and urine, which you'll be running through a special filtration system
to constantly recycle.
Lucky for you, the system mostly eliminates the taste of urine from the water.
Mostly.
Also, showers are going to be out of the question, but with enough room for only one person,
there'll be no company to complain about your smell.
Food is also going to be a problem, and that's because the bottom of the ocean is very much
a desert that's broken up occasionally by pockets of life.
Those pockets of life spring up around volcanic vents which spit out water full of gases and
minerals which the local life has adapted to consume.
You could choose to settle near one of these vents to have handy access to tubeworms and
all types of crabs, except the water temperature around these vents reaches hundreds of degrees
and will eventually destroy your habitat.
Instead you'll likely have to do much the same as the other inhabitants of the extreme
deep- wait for food to come down from above.
Known as 'marine snow', the constant snow-like debris that hangs in the water at the bottom
of the ocean is in fact the physical remains of dead life from the top.
While far too small for you to eat, you could always try to snag a wandering hagfish with
a robotic probe.
You could luck out though and stumble across a whale carcass, featuring enough rotting
meat to keep you satisfied for weeks.
Once the dead whale is gone though you'll be forced to sit tight and hope for another,
and given that scientists believe it can take weeks for the carcasses to float down to the
bottom, you'll be waiting quite a while for your next meal.
With water just one degree above freezing, you're going to have to keep warm or you'll
die of hypothermia long before you die of starvation.
Unfortunately for you battery power is only going to last so long, and with zero sunlight
reaching these extreme depths you can forget about solar.
Instead you will likely have to rely on an exterior water wheel of sorts, which turns
in the current and generates electricity.
This will likely not offer much wattage though as the water at the bottom of Challenger Deep
can be extremely still and currents are weak.
Instead you may have to make your own electricity by attaching internal pedals that can turn
the exterior water wheel, generating an electric charge.
The process isn't very efficient though and you'll have to spend the rest of your life
constantly pedaling or risk losing power and freezing to death.
Lastly, there's one very serious problem which we think you might likely overlook, and that's
the issue of going to the bathroom.
Once more you can forget about plumbing of any sort, as the moment you flush you're going
to have everything you just deposited blasted into your face and your habitat flood as the
ocean rushes in- this actually happened to a German submarine in World War 2, and the
sub was forced to surface and its crew captured simply because one sailor didn't know how
to properly work the toilet.
While a regular submarine can simply store waste and expel it at depths with lower pressures,
but if you tried to do the same you'd run into a similar problem as trying to turn on
a tap to bring in outside water to desalinate and drink it- namely that you'd immediately
flood your entire habitat.
Instead of flushing, you're going to have to keep your waste inside with you, and that
presents a whole host of problems which we really don't want to get into but should seem
pretty obvious.The good news is that if you did flush, the pressure is so great and the
water would rush in with so much force that it would cut your body in half and kill you
instantly, thus cutting short your miserable time at the bottom of the ocean.
Life at the bottom of the Mariana Trench would basically be impossible with modern technology,
unless you didn't mind living in a cramped hamster ball that slowly filled with your
own waste.
Perhaps in the future it may be truly possible for humanity to move beneath the waves, and
one day we might all be enjoying an undersea poop-free lifestyle free from the tyranny
of the topside world.
Until we discover plasmids and all murder each other that is.
How would you survive at the bottom of the Mariana Trench?
Would you kindly let us know in the comments?
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