WEBVTT

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David Biello: So Victor,
what have you been up to?

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Victor Vescovo: That's the bottom
of the Atlantic Ocean,

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and I guess I read too much
Jules Verne as a young boy,

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and so for the last four years
I've led a team to design and build

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what is now the most advanced

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and deepest diving
submersible on the planet,

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and I have the ability
to personally pilot it too.

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So this was us in December of last year

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for the first time --

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the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.

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DB: And nobody's seen that before right?

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That's just you.

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VV: No --

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well, now everybody else.

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DB: Who does that?

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Like --

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VV: Well, I think everyone has seen
the developments in the last 10,15 years.

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You have a bunch of people that have
the means to explore outer space,

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like SpaceX or Blue Origin --

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those guys --

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and we're going the other direction.

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So it's a wonderful era

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of private individuals
spending their resources

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to develop technologies
that can take us to places

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that have never been explored before,

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and the oceans of the world is --

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it's almost a cliché to say
it's 70 percent of our entire planet,

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and of that, 95 percent is unexplored.

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So what we're trying to
with our expedition

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is to build and prove out a submersible

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that can go to any point
on the bottom of the planet

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to explore the 60 percent of this planet
that is still unexplored.

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DB: You need a pretty cool tool
to do that, right?

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VV: Right.

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Now the tool is the submarine
the Limiting Factor.

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It's a state-of-the-art vessel

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supported by the support ship,
the Pressure Drop.

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It has a two-person titanium sphere,

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90 milimeters-thick,

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that keeps it at one atmosphere,

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and it has the ability to dive repeatedly

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down to the very deepest
point of the ocean.

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DB: So like the SpaceX
of ocean exploration?

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VV: Yeah, it's kind of the SpaceX
of ocean exploration,

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but I pilot my own vehicles.

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(Laughter)

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DB: Are you going to take Elon or...?

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VV: Yeah, I could take someone down there.

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So, Elon, I don't if you're listening,

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I'll give you a ride in mine
if you give me a ride in yours.

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(Laughter)

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DB: So tell us what it's like down there.

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I mean, we're talking about a place
where the pressure is so intense

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that it's like putting
an Eiffel Tower on your toe.

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VV: It's more than that.

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It's about 16,000 psi.

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So the issue is we have
this titanium sphere

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that allows us to go down
to these extreme depths

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and come up repeatedly.

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That's never been done before.

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The Challenger Deep has been dived twice,

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once in 1960 and once in 2012
by James Cameron,

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and they went down and came back up

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and those were experimental craft.

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This is the first commercially
certified submersible

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that can go up and down
thousands of times with two people,

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including a scientist.

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We're very proud

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that we just took down the deepest-diving
British citizen in history

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just three weeks ago,

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Dr. Alan Jamieson of Newcastle University

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who was down with us on the Java Trench.

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DB: So not too much freaks you out
is what I'm guessing.

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VV: Well, it's a lot
different to go diving.

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If you're claustrophobic you do not
want to be in the submarine.

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We go down quite a distance

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and the missions typically last
eight to nine hours in a confined space.

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It's very different from
the career I had previously

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which was mountain climbing
where you're in large, open spaces,

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the wind is whipping,

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it's very, very cold.

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This is the opposite.

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It's much more technical.

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It's much more about precision
and using the instruments

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and troubleshooting anything
that can go wrong.

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But actually if something
really goes wrong in the submersible,

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you're not going to know it.

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(Laughter)

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DB: So you're afraid of leaks
is what you're saying.

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VV: Leaks are not good,

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but if it's a leak that's happening,

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well at least it's not that bad

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because if it was really bad
you wouldn't know it, again but --

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you know, fire in the capsule,

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that wouldn't be good either,

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but no, it's actually a very,
very safe submersible.

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I like to say I don't trust
a lot of things in life,

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but I do trust titanium,

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I trust math

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and I trust Finite Element Analysis,

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which is how you figure out

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whether or not things
like this can survive

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these extraordinary
pressures and conditions.

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DB: And that sphere
is so perfectly machined, right?

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This is a truly unique craft.

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VV: That was the real trick --

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is actually building a titanium sphere

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that was accurate
to within .1 percent of machine.

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Titanium is a hard mill to work

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and a lot of people haven't
figured it out,

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but we were very fortunate.

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I've been working
with an extraordinary team

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that was able to make
an almost perfect sphere,

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which when you're subjecting
something to pressure,

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that's the strongest
geometry you can have.

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When I'm in the submersible
and that hatch closes,

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I actually feel very confident

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that I'm going to go down
and come back up.

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DB: And that's the thing
you double-check --

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that the hatch is closed?

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VV: There are only two rules
in diving a submarine.

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Number one is close the hatch securely.

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Number two is go back to rule number one.

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DB: Alright so, Atlantic Ocean:

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check.

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Southern Ocean:

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check --

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VV: No one has ever dived
the Southern Ocean before.

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I know why.

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It's really, really hostile.

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The weather is awful.

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The word collision comes to mind.

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But we did that one, yes.

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Glad that's over --

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DB: Yeah --

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VV: Thank you

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(Applause)

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DB: It's like you're racing through it.

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And now the Indian Ocean,

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as Kelly mentioned.

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VV: Yeah, that was three weeks ago.

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We were fortunate enough
to actually solve the mystery.

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If someone had asked me three weeks ago,

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"What is the deepest point
in the Indian Ocean?"

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no one really knew.

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There were two candidates,

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one off of Western Australia
and one in the Java Trench.

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We have this wonderful ship
with a brilliant sonar.

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We mapped both of them.

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We sent landers down
to the bottom and verified,

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it's actually in the center portion
of the Java Trench,

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which is where no one thought it was.

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In fact, every time we've completed
one of our major dives,

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we have to run off 
to Wikipedia and change it

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because it's completely wrong.

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(Laughter)

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DB: So it probably takes longer
to get down there

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than the time you're able
to spend down there?

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VV: No, we actually spend
quite a bit of time.

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I have four days of oxygen
supply in the vessel.

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If I'm down there for four days,

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something's gone so wrong
I'm probably not going to use it,

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but it about three-hours down
to the deepest part of the ocean

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and then we can spend
usually three or four hours

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and then another three hours up.

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So you don't want to stay in there
for more than 10 or 11 hours.

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It can get a little tight.

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DB: Alright, so the bottom
of the Indian Ocean,

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and this something that no one
besides you has ever seen before --

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VV: This is actually imagery
from one of our robotic landers.

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On the bottom-right you can actually
see a robust assfish --

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that's what it's actually called --

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(Laughter)

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but you can see from the left
a creature that's never been seen before.

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It's actually a bottom-dwelling jellyfish
called a stalked ascidian,

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and none of them have ever
looked like this before.

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It actually has a small child
at the bottom of its stalk,

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and it just drifted across beautifully.

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So every single dive we have gone on,

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even though we're only down there
for a couple of hours,

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we have found three or four new species

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because these are places that have
been isolated for billions of years

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and no human being has ever
been down there to film them

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or take samples.

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And so this is extraordinary for us --

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(Applause)

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So what we are hoping --

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the main objective of our mission
is to build this tool.

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This tool is a door,

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because with this tool,

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we'll be able to make
more of them potentially

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and take scientists down
to do thousands of dives

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to open that door to exploration

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and find things that we
had no idea even existed.

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DB: And so more people have been
to space than the bottom of the ocean.

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You're one of three.

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You're going to up that number,

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you're going to give it away.

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VV: Yeah, three people have dived
to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean.

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[The Trieste] in 1960
with two individuals,

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James Cameron in 2012
with his Deep Sea Challenger --

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thank you, Jim,

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great sub.

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This is a third-generation technology.

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We're not only going to try and go down,

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actually in two weeks,

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but we're going to try and do it
multiple times,

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which has never been done before.

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If we can do that,

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we'll have proven the technology

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and that door will not just go open,

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it will stay open.

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(Applause)

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DB: Fantastic.

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Good luck.

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VV: Thank you very much.

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DB: Thank you.

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VV: Thank you all.

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(Applause)