The Russian autonomous submarine Vitiaz managed to reach the deepest point on the planet, known as the Mariana Trench , in the Pacific Ocean, and placed a pennant there in commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany in World War II , as reported on Monday by the Advanced Research Foundation (FIA).
Specially designed to resist high pressures and designed to explore the depths of the sea, this submersible vessel set a new world record for an autonomous and unmanned underwater apparatus, after descending to a depth of 10,028 meters on the first attempt.
“On May 8, 2020, at 10:34 PM Moscow time, the Russian autonomous uninhabited underwater vehicle Vitiaz reached the bottom of the Mariana Trench. Vitiaz’s sensors recorded a depth of 10,028 meters,” the FPI announced in a statement.
The dive lasted three hours, not counting the return and the ascent to the surface. At that time, the device recorded images of the seabed and also carried out a cartographic analysis of this area of the Pacific Ocean.
Communication between Vitiaz and the surface was carried out in real-time and through hydroacoustic channels.
From the foundation, they emphasized that, unlike other submarine apparatuses that reached the bottom of the seas, such as the Japanese Kaiko and the American Nereus, the Russian bathyscaphe works completely autonomously.
“Thanks to the use of artificial intelligence elements in the device’s command system, it can autonomously avoid obstacles on its way, find an exit route in tight spaces,” they explained.
Andrei Grigoriev, director of the foundation, told the Sputnik agency: “This is the first of the experiments scheduled under the Vitiaz project. It was carried out together with Russian shippers and scientific teams from the Russian Academy of Sciences, with the support of the Pacific Fleet. ”
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov assured that this feat “is a great achievement” both for science and for the national defense industry.
Vitiaz bears the same name as the Soviet scientific research vessel that in 1957 determined the deepest place in the Mariana Trench, at 11,022 meters.
With this technology, Russia managed to match the milestone achieved in 2019 by the American Victor Vescovo, who reached with his submersible to a depth of 10,935 meters in the crags of the Marianas, twenty meters more than the mark that the film director James had held since 2012 Cameron.
