The Deepest Deep

Someone once said that small minds are impressed by big numbers. Well I qualify.

I was just looking at a very impressive big number that had to do with the deepest place on the face of the Earth. The Marianas Trench near the island of Guam.

The bottom of this deep trench in the floor of the Pacific Ocean is under nearly seven miles of water. The measured depth is 35,840 feet. If you dropped Mount Everest, the highest place on Earth, into the Marianas Trench the summit would still be under 6800 feet of water.

As you know water has weight, a square inch one foot high weighs about a half pound. So, for every foot of ocean water the weight on a square inch increases by half a pound. That's the pressure you feel in your ears at the bottom of a pool. Now imagine 35, 840 feet times ½ in pounds of pressure per square inch. That's nearly 18, 000 pounds or nine tons per square inch. That'd hurt your ears. It's like the weight of nine cars on every square inch.

Two men, Picard and Walsh, piloted a submersible called the Triest (see photo) in 1960 to the bottom of the Trench. On the bottom they found some fish and shrimp living happily.

People have not been to the bottom since the descent of Picard and Walsh in 1960.

I guess that's why they say we know less about the oceans than the Moon.