China's Jiaolong submersible finishes first dive this year

ABOARD XIANGYANGHONG 09, July 16 -- China's manned deep-sea submersible, Jiaolong, finished its first dive of this year's expedition mission Wednesday in the northwest Pacific Ocean.

During an over nine-hour dive, the vehicle reached a depth of 2,424 meters in the open sea, and tested a remotely-operated underwater vehicle aboard the submersible.

Jiaolong also took sediment and water samples, and surveyed the microtopography of the sea floor via sonar systems.

The vehicle, developed by Chinese scientists, will make its second dive in this voyage on Thursday, with a task to film benthic animals and cobalt-rich crusts in the deep sea areas.

The vehicle's carrier, Xiangyanghong 09, set sail on July 4 from Fuzhou, capital of east China's Fujian province, for the submersible's first expedition mission in the 2014-2015 period.

After the voyage, Jiaolong is scheduled for another mission later this year in the southwest Indian Ocean to carry out scientific research on polymetallic sulfides.

The submersible, named after a mythical sea dragon, reached 7,062 meters in the Pacific's Mariana Trench in a dive in June 2012.