China wraps up Atlantic deep-sea expedition as the US looks on with suspicion
- Chinese researchers complete excursion across Indian and Atlantic oceans, where they collected environmental data, rock samples and marine life
- US analysts are increasingly concerned that China’s ocean exploration will give it an edge in deep-sea mining and intelligence
After a 164-day excursion across 57,000km (35,418 miles) of the Atlantic and Indian oceans, the Shenhai Yihao – mother ship of China’s Jiaolong research submersible – docked in the eastern port city of Qingdao on Tuesday.
During the excursion, 46 dives were conducted – a record for a single expedition – allowing researchers to collect environmental data and biological and geological samples, according to a report by Guanhai News, a news site owned by Qingdao Daily.
“This voyage is the first time we have used Jiaolong to conduct a survey in the Atlantic Ocean,” Sun Yongfu, chief scientist of the ocean expedition and a researcher at the National Deep Sea Centre, told Guanhai News.
The Mid-Atlantic Ridge, a mostly underwater mountain range formed by the continuous separation of tectonic plates, spans the ocean that separates Europe and Africa from the Americas.
The ridge contains hydrothermally active areas with extremely high temperatures and unique ecosystems that are of interest to scientific researchers.