Black Box 5 Miles Deep?

[Prudie]

If and if MH370's black box really is 5+ miles deep in the sea, have we got the technology to fetch it anyway?

[boxtops]

Good question - do any submarines go that deep? or could it be trawled.....

[tiggerblue10]

Would a submersible be able to pick it up?

[Prudie]

I really don't know, obviously it would have to be unmanned - wouldn't it?

[jno]

there's a movie in this

http://deepseachallenge.com/

[quizzkid]

I don't think that they can go that deep. I have read about one going into the Marianna's Trench but I don't know how deep that actually is or if it had people on board.

[tonyav]

http://www.wisegeek.org/what-is-the-deepest-depth-a-submarine-can-go.htm

[vulcan42]

This unmanned sub can go nearly 7 miles down.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8080324.stm

[jim360]

Marianas Trench is about 12 miles deep, and we have been there with people on board, but essentially the craft was designed to survive the pressures at that distance and not much else. To do anything useful 5 miles down is tricky. I think the best we have is Alvin, that goes about three miles down.

[vulcan42]

Alvin was having an upgrade to enable travel to 4 miles but I'm not sure if it's available yet.

[jim360]

Whoops, Marianas Trench is 12 kilometres not 12 miles.

[Sqad]

Just "off topic" for the moment......I have been thinking.
With all this sophisticated scientific equipment for underwater surveillance, surely now we could solve the question of the "Loch Ness monster."

[Prudie]

Probably sqad but not that good for tourism.

[Sqad]

;-) ^^^

[jim360]

I think they tried it once and the results were inconclusive. I doubt it will be tried again because it's rather expensive and time-consuming to perform the required sweep of the entire loch, and anyway I don't think the claims are taken seriously enough any more by the people who have the required equipment. Finding a plane with 270 dead people on it that definitely exists somewhere is more of a priority than trying to confirm that a creature doesn't exist -- and, anyway, I'm fairly sure that the result would be ignored: "there could always be some cave it hid in while you were searching..."

[EDDIE51]

I don't think we have, we may be able to get a look at it with a remote camera but not to pick it up.

[RATTER15]

With all the controversy surrounding this plane it would be worth someone building or adapting a specialised sub to go down there.

[EDDIE51]

^^ would cost tens of millions of $ , at the moment nothing can go that deep and actually pick it up, possibly photograph it but not collect it.

[Prudie]

In that case maybe the best we'll ever know is it went down in the sea and they're not all on some Conspiracy Island. But we may never know why without data recordings. A very tragic event all round.

[tonyav]

I believe that the battery in a Black box only lasts for 30 days.

[boxtops]

The chap on the TV news last night said that there is a chance that if they don't find it before the black box starts transmitting, they could start a total scan of the ocean floor - which would take years.