Explorer Retains Deep Dive Record After 50 Years

Donald Walsh's journey to the bottom of the ocean has never been repeated

21 June 2010

Donald WalshStill exploring after 50 years, Donald Walsh is shown here at the North Pole.

Donald Walsh grew up near San Francisco in the 1930s. Among his earliest memories is the mega-construction project he saw from his home in the Berkeley hills.

"Namely, the Golden Gate Bridge," he says. "And I used to watch the ships go out over the horizon. I was seven or eight years old and from that age on I really got keen at going to the sea and knowing about the ocean."

Early dream

Walsh graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1954. A chance assignment in 1958 led him to the Trieste.

He tested the free-diving self-propelled submersible — one of only two in existence at the time — on increasingly deep dives off the California coast. He was told of a plan to take the bathyscaphe to the deepest part of the ocean, roughly 11,500 meters or deeper than Mt. Everest is high.

US NHHCThe Trieste right before her dive to 35,800 feet in the Challenger Trench in the Pacific Ocean near Guam.

"That really got my attention because I knew I was going to be a part of it," says Walsh.

The Trieste is now on permanent display at the Naval Museum in Washington. The bathyscaphe is over 16 meters long, and its gasoline-filled flotation chamber's deck, rails, and conning tower make it look a bit like a submarine.