Richard Branson is well on his way to space. Now he plans to
explore the deepest parts of the ocean as well.
announced his undersea exploration venture, Virgin Oceanic, on
Tuesday. Unlike his suborbital-space-flight company, Virgin
Galactic, the new venture is not accepting paying passengers.
Instead, it will comprise only five
deep-sea dives, each one carrying just one person, to the
deepest points in each of the five oceans.
To make the dives, Virgin
has built a custom submarine and a flashy promotional
video. The sub's cockpit has a bubble-like dome made of quartz,
which can withstand 6 million kilos of pressure across its surface,
Overall, the sub looks a bit like an aeroplane, the better to
"fly" to its underwater destinations. It weighs 3,600 kilos, is
made of carbon fibre and titanium, and is rated to withstand
pressure up to 37,000 feet below the surface. It's not fast,
though, with a maximum speed of just 3 knots and the ability to
dive at 1.8 metres per second, so its life-support systems are
meant to last up to 24 hours.
In addition to its one human, the sub will have a water sampling
system that can filter microbes and viruses from the water for
later study. It will also be able to deploy unmanned probes. So
far, the sub has only gone for a dip in San Francisco Bay.
Virgin Oceanic notes that sub was originally the brainchild of
aviator and adventurer Steve Fossett, a friend of Branson's, who
crashed during a solo plane flight in 2007 but whose remains
weren't found until 2008.
To support and transport the sub, Virgin has retrofitted
carbon-fiber racing catamaran with a crane, generators and
lots of electronics.
The first dive will be to the bottom of the
Mariana Trench, a 36,201-foot canyon deep in the western
Pacific. Humans have made it to the bottom of the Mariana Trench
just once before, in 1960. The commander of that expedition,
Jacques Piccard, later recounted the experience of that
The second dive will be to the bottom of the Puerto Rico Trench,
which at 8,600 metres below the surface is the deepest trench in
the Atlantic Ocean. Branson himself plans to pilot the sub for this
journey. Branson will be the backup pilot for the Mariana dive too,
if his designated pilot is unable to do it. Three other dives are
planned, each to the deepest point of other three oceans.
There's a serious scientific
purpose to Virgin Oceanic's missions, Virgin says, with actual
scientists lined up to make the most of these dives for their
research into bottom-dwelling microbes, bioluminescence and
But mostly, we suspect, it will be an excellent adventure for
the man Wired has called a "happy-go-lucky
tycoon." More power to you, Sir Richard. We'll be watching for
the IMAX movie.