On the Water Deep
On the Water Deep Discovery Whole New World Pairing an audacious spirit with extraordinary scientific expertise, EYOS Expeditions takes intrepid travellers where no one has gone before. By Cornelia Marioglou The research ship Pressure Drop floats above the Molloy Deep, between Greenland and Svalbard, as part of the Five Deeps Expedition S ocial isolation has become one of the year’s defining features, but Rob McCallum has been living far from the madding crowd for years. The co-founder and mission designer at EYOS Expeditions, a yachting charter company, specialises in creating and arranging excursions to previously inaccessible places. As we speak, he had just returned from an adventure in Guam and a journey as expedition leader to the bottom of the ocean. “We are operating on our own, in very remote locations,” he says, “and it’s a wonderful world, but it’s a different world to the one we are living in.” This most recent of his otherworldly expeditions was to the Mariana Trench, the deepest oceanic depression on Earth. It was an eye-opening experience for the Seattle-based New Zealander, who travelled to the bottom of the famed Challenger Deep in the submersible Limiting Factor as part of the Ring of Fire expedition. “We have always been told that the 48 CENTURION-MAGAZINE.COM
The Triton submersible Limiting Factor preparing to dive in Mariana Trench, left, and off Tonga, below PHOTOS REEVE JOLLIFFE terrain at the Mariana Trench was flat, very even,” says McCallum. “But no, it’s not. There are slopes, there are big boulders – and there is life.” While the extreme pressure inhibits the survival of “bony” animals, he says, McCallum was fascinated by the creatures he did find. “Life at the bottom of the ocean exists in the form of different worms, and some of these are quite amazing. They can lift off the bottom and fly around like butterflies – they are fascinating animals.” The Ring of Fire challenge carries on the work of the ambitious Five Deeps Expedition, a project more than half a decade in the making that set out to explore the deepest points of the world’s five oceans – the Puerto Rico, South Sandwich, Java and Mariana trenches and the Molloy Deep – in collaboration with American explorer Victor Vescovo and Triton Submarines, with whom EYOS worked to create Limiting Factor. “This was the biggest challenge,” McCallum says of the vessel. “Triton builds some incredible vehicles – a small company that do something governments can’t.” The Florida-based submersibles firm also produced the landers that are sent down to measure the seawater and conditions, information that is relayed back to the mothership before the submersible is sent down. Such advances enabled the Five Deeps Expedition to break records from its first dive in December 2018 to the final one in September last year. Overall, 39 dives were conducted, and numerous world records and world firsts achieved: most notably, the expedition reached a new world depth record of 10,924m. It also conducted the first visits by humans to the bottom on the Southern, Atlantic, Indian and Arctic Oceans. A scientific programme led by renowned chief scientist Dr Alan Jamieson of Newcastle University, will, in time, produce findings from these unexplored depths to the global academic, oceanographic and environmental communities. This technical ability to explore hidden corners of the world is incredibly rare, and coupled with the inquisitiveness and dedication of every person involved – a dive can take up to 18 to 20 hours – makes EYOS unique in the world. “I think all of our team, the people that work for EYOS, are very curious people,” says McCallum. “They want to know what is over the new horizon. We very much enjoy the skill of doing something, creating something in a remote place, in a remote location where it might not have been done before.” With around 1,200 expeditions under their belt there is still a desire to explore further, given the opportunity. “We are driven by our clients, wherever our clients want to go, that’s where we go,” affirms McCallum. “There’s no place where we can’t go. Our job is to turn your dream into reality. If you come to us with an idea, we can make it happen.” eyos-expeditions.com • SPIRIT OF ADVENTURE: THREE NEW EXPLORER YACHTS Delivered this summer, La Datcha is the ultimate luxe expedition yacht. The SeaXplorer 77 was built at the Damen shipyard in the Netherlands, with EYOS acting as consultants, and is equipped to travel to far-flung destinations – from polar adventures to tropical climes – and has two helicopters stored in the hangar deck. Available for charter; ladatcha.com Ancona-based Cantiere Delle Marche recently introduced the EXP 42 to the market – a design that lives up to sales and marketing director Vasco Buonpensiere’s maxim for what makes an explorer yacht: “It isn’t about its shape, it’s about its reliability, its range capacity and ability to face any weather condition in comfort and style.”; cantieredellemarche.it With Olivia O, a Norwegian yard known for its range of highly efficient vessels for commercial shipping, Ulstein Verft, has delivered a yacht with its remarkable inverted bow concept, the X-Bow. Built in Norway for a private owner and outfitted at the Palumbo Superyachts shipyard in Malta, this 88.5m explorer has exterior lines and general arrangement by Monaco-based Norwegian, Espen Oeino; ulstein.com CENTURION-MAGAZINE.COM 49
