Heather Stewart, a Scottish scientist from Edinburgh, recently made history when she joined an all-female crew on the deepest dive ever.
Heather Stewart of Edinburgh and her companion Kate Wawatai used the Bakunawa submersible to descend into the South Pacific Ocean. They spent around 10 hours underwater, setting a new record.
Professor Stewart, a marine geologist, stated that they were unaware they would be setting a world record until that day. During their descent, Kate theorized that it could be the first time a woman had reached such depths, which it was. They both ended up setting world records.
Please celebrate my friend & former shipmate Kate Wawatai🇳🇿 + marine geologist Heather Stewart 🏴 who just made a world-record dive into the Nova-Canton Trough (Central Pacific), a first for an all-female submersible team, with Kate as PILOT!!! 🌊🐙🐬🦑 cc pic.twitter.com/UTwJpHcRJr
— Dr. Dawn Wright + @deepseadawn.bsky.social 🇺🇦 (@deepseadawn)The Nova-Canton Trough is the name given to the maritime area in which both scientists work. It resembles a fracture zone, 400 miles long and 8,000 meters deep. Both women live in Samoa and travel four days to this place. Their crew collects information on the ocean's biodiversity and geology.
Professor Stewart called it an incredible chance. She stated, "We were diving to a depth comparable to Mount Everest, the tallest mountain on Earth."
Professor Stewart has been a marine geologist since 2001. She went diving for the first time in 2019 and has returned five times since. Before then, she had dived to a depth of 6000 meters. Despite feeling frightened, she is not afraid since she enjoys it.
She said, "We're going places no one has ever been. We're finding stuff that people didn't realize existed. I've seen wonderful sponges, fish, octopuses, and other deep-sea species." Underwater, time moves swiftly because you never know what you will see next. So it's quite thrilling.
Read Exclusive COVID-19 Coronavirus News updates, at MyNation.