The dragon and the abyss

China's deep-sea submersible Jiaolong (蛟龙) has opened the alien world of the ocean's deepest depths to the nation's explorers

At a mere 200 meters straight down, the Chinese crew of three, Ye Cong, Liu Kaizhou and Yang Bo, enters the Twilight Zone, a land where the light of the sun begins to give way, continuing all the way down to 1,000 meters. Then they enter a land of no sunlight, the Midnight Zone, a 3,000 meters drop where the only light that exists is found in the bioluminescence of the void's strange creatures.

From there, the crew drops farther into the Abyssopelagic Zone, commonly known as the abyss, where sparse invertebrate life-forms - contorted by pressure, isolation, near freezing water and darkness - scratch out a meager existence at 6,000 meters below sea level. When they reached the bottom of the abyss, they dived farther.

In June 2012 the whole of the Chinese nation looked to the skies for Shenzhou IX, which would dock with Tiangong I and become a profound source of national pride for all Chinese people. At the same time, fewer but perhaps more practical eyes were set on the inky blackness of the Mariana Trench, with China's first deep-sea submersible to break deep-sea diving records with a near 10-hour dive to 6,963 meters, smashing Japan's previous record of 6,500 meters (and later reaching well over seven kilometers).

While China's work in outer space may get all the attention and patriotic chest-thumping, for a real look at how China is affecting the world of scientific exploration, it is best to look down, not up, for a tiny submersible that can go to places more alien than the moon. Its name is Jiaolong (), the flood dragon.

Only two vessels have ever gone deeper than Jiaolong, most recently Canadian filmmaker James Cameron on a solo trip to Challenger Deep, the deepest known point on the Earth's seabed, recording a maximum depth of 10,908 meters.

In 1960 the Trieste, a Swiss-designed, Italian-built deep-diving research bathyscaphe, reached a record maximum depth of about 10,911 meters in the trench, which has a measured depth of 10,898 meters to 10,916 meters. Unlike vehicles that are considered submarines, bathyscaphes have minimal mobility and are built like a balloon.

Unlike many of the deep submergence vehicles that have come before it, Jiaolong is extremely maneuverable, boasting seven propellers that can move it in any direction, so maneuverable in fact that it was suggested that it help look for the flight data recorder of the ill-fated Malaysia Airlines' flight MH370. Able to withstand 10,000 tons of pressure and with a powerful sonar system that can map the seafloor in detail for 200 meters, China possesses arguably the most maneuverable deep-submerine vehicle in the world.

However, China's deep submergence vehicles did not begin with Jiaolong and, much as we would all like to think otherwise, this expensive and dangerous endeavor did not grow with science alone in mind. Indeed, it was the discovery of deep-sea vents in the mid- to late- 1970s that spurred state interest in deep-sea submersibles as part of a hunt for precious resources, and it is this motive that keeps the vessels bankrolled today.

China's greatest weapon in this hunt for deep-sea resources, the Dayang Yihao (), China's most advanced research vessel of the age, went into service in 1995. Also worthy of mention is the Sea Pole 1 bathyscaphe that could drill, sample and videotape at incredible depths, a piece of equipment that ran roughly $180 million.

The potential and success of this plan led to massive funding in the Ninth Five-Year Plan (1996-2000), giving rise to Jiaolong, a project held in near absolute secrecy until its unveiling. It was part of the eerily named 863 Program of the Chinese government, which saw the creation of supercomputers, lasers, spacecraft, biotechnology, and this very special deep-submerine vehicle.

Only a handful of countries, apart from China, have ever developed deep sea-diving technology, including Australia, the United States, Russia, Japan, Italy, Switzerland and France. Though China was the last to join the deep-sea aquanauts, it went from a nation unconcerned with deep-sea exploration to one with one of the most advanced submersibles on Earth, able to reach 99.8 percent of the ocean floor.

But who are the brave souls who volunteer to go into the unknown, to a hell on Earth with near-freezing temperatures, no sunlight and pressure up to 1,000 times that at sea level? Unlike those who pick astronauts, the recruiters in charge of deep-sea missions do not take from a massive ocean of military pilots and engineers. Rather, they must rely on a smaller pool of marine and mechanical engineers. However, the training is no less rigorous than that faced by their comrades in space.

Two years of intense training and 119 basic requirements narrow the small batch of recruits, with anything from stuttering to body odor disqualifying many otherwise qualified applicants. The National Deep Sea center had a drive for female recruits in 2013; Tang Limei became the first woman to dive in Jiaolong that year.

Dive after dive, Jiaolong is becoming somewhat of a national icon. In July, the submersible even played host to the Youth Olympics torch, taking it to a depth of 5,555 m, a cakewalk for this record-breaker. While it was there, it took water and sediment samples and mapped the local topography.

Jiaolong recently has been berthed at Mawei port on its carrier, the Xiangyanghong 09, in Fuzhou, Fujian province, where tourists go to see this eight-meter marvel.

Lately it has been prospecting for minerals. Shortly after its successful launch to 7,000 meters and beyond in 2012, the craft found cobalt-rich ferromanganese crust ore in the western Pacific. China has signed an exploration deal with the International Seabed Authority to explore those waters (3,000 square kilometers worth) over the next 15 years. Last year Jiaolong went on 113 missions, discovering dozens of resource hot spots, such as iron-manganese deposits in the South China Sea.

The future of deep-sea exploration for China looks bright. There are other vehicles besides Jiaolong, such as the Harmony class bathyscaphe. But the future of Chinese deep-submerine vehicles is the Rainbow Fish. Due to be built by 2020, it is to be designed to dive with three crew members as low as 11,000 meters - slightly deeper than the measured lowest point in Challenger Deep. It would have a 4,000 ton mother ship.

China's deep-sea submersibles have already brought back photos of our alien oceans that will inspire generations of explorers and scientists: mussels clinging to vents seeping methane and hydrogen sulfide and snowy white crabs feeding on tubeworms at pressures that boggle the mind. China's exploration of the abyss and beyond is just beginning.

Courtesy of the World of Chinese

www.theworldofchinese.com

(China Daily Africa Weekly 11/07/2014 page27)