Current Event:

Canadian-born filmmaker and undersea explorer James Cameron recently became the first person to dive solo to the deepest-known part of the world’s ocean. Cameron descended to a canyon called the Mariana Trench, which lies nearly 7 miles (11 kilometers) below the surface of the western Pacific Ocean. Before Cameron, the only persons to descend into the Mariana Trench were U.S. Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh and the late Swiss oceanographer Jacques Piccard, who explored the trench together in the submersible Trieste in 1960.

James Cameron became the first person to dive solo to the deepest part of the ocean. (Courtesy Jason LaVeris, FilmMagic/Getty Images)

Objective:

The area where James Cameron explored is the lowest-known point of Earth’s crust. The Behind the Headlines news story and related World Book articles will virtually take readers on his journey.

Words To Know:

• arthropods
• Earth’s crust
• explorer
• filmmaker
• Guam
• James Cameron
• Mariana Trench
• Newfoundland and Labrador
• oceanography
• Pacific Ocean
• Robert D. Ballard
• submersible
• Titanic

Discussion Topics:

1. Although James Cameron is best known as a filmmaker, he has made more than 70 ocean dives over the years, including a dozen during the filming of Titanic, a movie about the sinking of the largest and most luxurious ocean liner of the day. The Titanic struck an iceberg on April 14, 1912, during its maiden voyage from England to the United States, causing the deaths of more than 1,500 people. Commemorate the 100^th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic with your students by explaining the disaster and why it sank, though people said the ship was “unsinkable.”

2. Cameron descended to a canyon called the Mariana Trench, which lies nearly 7 miles (11 kilometers) below the surface of the western Pacific Ocean. The area, the lowest-known point of Earth’s crust, is located near the United States Territory of Guam and is known as a “deep.” Ask your students what they know about deeps. (Deeps refer to any ocean area that has a depth of more than 18,000 feet (5,490 meters). More than 100 deeps have been discovered in ocean floors. Contrary to popular belief, they are not found in the center of the ocean. Most of them are found close to mountainous islands where steep shores plunge down to the bottom of the sea.)

3. Cameron reached the Mariana Trench in a submersible called Deepsea Challenger. Submersibles are research vessels built to withstand the crushing pressures and near-freezing temperatures found in ocean depths. Deepsea Challenger is a 26-foot- (7.9-meter-) high capsule that descends upright. Take your students through the Diving, Underwater article and explain how diving in vehicles differs from ambient diving.

4. According to Cameron, he found the seafloor to be “devoid of sunlight, devoid of any heat, any warmth.” He reported that it was “completely featureless and uniform” and that the only organisms he saw were tiny, shrimp-like arthropods (animals with jointed legs and no backbone). Ask your students if this is how they pictured the deepest depth of the ocean to be like. If not, what did they expect to see?