THERE IS
MORE
BELOW.
A made-up expedition to the deepest point of the ocean. The ocean and its numbers are real.
Start the descentA small light.
A very big ocean.
RED GOES
FIRST.
Water takes red light in the first 10 to 20 meters. Watch the jellyfish. Our buttons lose it too.
YOU HAVE
COMPANY.
At 200 m about 1% of the sunlight is left. Three in four animals down here make light of their own.
THE SUN
IS GONE.
Below 1,000 m your cursor is the only light.Below 1,000 m your finger is the only light. Something red is hiding here. Find it, then tap it.
Atolla jellyfish. When something grabs it, it flashes a ring of blue light. The alarm calls bigger animals to eat the attacker.
Something down here is fishing.
Humpback anglerfish. The light on its rod is bacteria living inside the lure.
HALF A TON
PER SQUARE
CENTIMETER.
That is the water pressing on you at 5,000 m. Our lander is calling from the bottom. Find its frequency.
Static. Keep turning.
THE LAST
FISH.
No fish has been filmed deeper than 8,336 m. A young snailfish, Izu-Ogasawara Trench, 2022. Below it, the crustaceans take over.
10,935 m
Challenger Deep. The deepest point we know of. Our lander got here first, and its lamps are the first warm color for 10 kilometers.
Hirondellea gigas. Amphipods about 3 cm long. Their gut turns sunken wood into sugar.
WHO YOU
PASSED
Five animals from the way down, drawn from field records. The bar shows where each one lives.
-
Atolla jellyfish
Atolla wyvillei
1,000 to 4,000 mBell 2 to 17 cm. Grabbed, it flashes a blue alarm that calls in bigger predators.
-
Giant siphonophore
Praya dubia
Surface to 600 mUp to 40 m long. Not one animal: a colony of clones, each doing one job.
-
Humpback anglerfish
Melanocetus johnsonii
100 to 4,500 mFemales about 18 cm. The glowing lure is full of bacteria.
-
Hadal snailfish
Pseudoliparis sp.
Filmed at 8,336 mThe deepest fish ever filmed. A juvenile, Izu-Ogasawara Trench, 2022.
-
Hadal amphipod
Hirondellea gigas
Below 8,000 mOver 3 cm. Collected at 10,897 m. Digests sunken wood into sugar.
EVEREST
WOULD
DROWN.
Stand it on the floor of the Challenger Deep and 2,086 m of water would still be above the summit.
- Sunlight
- 1% left at 200 m. None below 1,000 m.
- Pressure
- Up 1 atmosphere every 10 m. About 1,090 at the bottom.