HMS Challenger Expedition 1872-76
The Challenger expedition of 1872-76 was a scientific exercise that made many discoveries to lay the foundation of oceanography. HMS Challenger was a steam-assisted Royal Navy Pearl-class corvette launched in 1858 at the Woolwich Dockyard. She was picked to undertake the first global marine research expedition: the Challenger expedition. To enable her to probe the depths, all but two of the Challenger's guns had been removed and her spars reduced to make more space available. Laboratories, extra cabins and a special dredging platform were installed. She was loaded with specimen jars, alcohol for preservation of samples, microscopes and chemical apparatus, trawls and dredges, thermometers and water sampling bottles, sounding leads and devices to collect sediment from the sea bed and great lengths of rope with which to suspend the equipment into the ocean depths. In all she was supplied with 181 miles of Italian hemp for sounding, trawling and dredging. The Challenger's crew was the first to sound the deepest part of the ocean, thereafter named the Challenger Deep. The Challenger carried a complement of 243 officers, scientists and crew when she embarked on her 68,890-nautical-mile journey.
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