Saturday, April 09, 2011

Branson turns his attention to the ocean depths

He built an airline. He's financing a suborbital spaceship designed by Burt Rutan. He appeared in a Superman movie. So where does Richard Branson find another frontier to conquer?
Hear him explain it: "What if I were to tell you about a planet inhabited by ‘intelligent’ beings that had, in the 21st century, physically explored zero percent of its deepest points and mapped only three percent of its oceans by unmanned craft, when 70 percent of that planet's surface was made up of water?"
Branson's one-man Virgin Oceanic submarine will be able to penetrate the depths of the seas, even the Mariana Trench, where the weight of seven miles of water would crush any of the world's large nuclear subs. Later this year, Chis Welsh will "fly" the winged sub to that depth. Branson himself will do some of the future dives.

Well, you can't accuse the man of thinking small.

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