HAIKOU /China/, March 22. /TASS/. Sanya city on the southern coast of Hainan province plans to speed up the implementation of key deep ocean projects that will play an important role in boosting China's development, the Hainan Daily reported.
According to the newspaper, specialists from the Sanya Yazhou Bay Science and Technology City tested lifting equipment for extra-heavy cargo in Hainan last year as part of the goal. It successfully accomplished the task by lifting a steel structure weighing 3,325 tons to a height of 10 meters for the first time in the province's history. Such technology is expected to become increasingly common in servicing Chinese research vessels and bathyscaphes that return to the island after completing long expeditions.
"We will strive to increase the efficiency of deep-sea projects and reduce their costs," Du Mengzhan of the The Center for Deep Sea Research at the Chinese Academy of Sciences told the paper. She said the introduction of modern instruments and powerful equipment for studying the oceans has become an important factor in boosting China's intensive development.
The local authorities noted that they will continue to form an advanced technological cluster in the field of deep-sea research in Sanya. The Hainan administration plans to provide assistance to special scientific laboratories and stimulate training of qualified personnel for this purpose.
The Chinese government is actively developing deep-sea research projects in Hainan, both to develop the richest ocean resources and to study fauna of the most remote and inaccessible corners of the underwater world, to implement environmental protection projects. In November 2020, the manned bathyscaphe Fendouzhe ("Wrestler") set a new PRC record for diving to the bottom of the Mariana Trench, descending to a depth of more than 10.9 km. After successfully completing the mission, it returned to the port of Sanya.