Talk:Mariana Trench

Lead and adjacent footnote disagree on Challenger Deep's depth (10,984 vs 10,994 m)

The lead, citing Gardner et al. (2014), says: "The maximum known depth is Template:Convert at the southern end of a small slot-shaped valley in its floor known as the Challenger Deep." But the very next sentence's footnote (comparing with Everest) flatly states: "Mariana Trench is Template:Cvt deep," cited to a different source.

Two different "the depth" figures appear within a few words of each other. The 10-m gap is technically inside Gardner et al.'s ±25 m uncertainty, but the article isn't presenting these as one measurement with uncertainty — it's presenting two different point figures in two different places. The body should pick one survey result (probably 10,984 ± 25 m, the more recent multibeam figure) and either drop the 10,994 m number or annotate it as an earlier survey ("the older figure of 10,994 m, often quoted, is consistent with this within the uncertainty"). Rome (talk) 01:02, 5 May 2026 (UTC)

The wikitext confirms the problem exactly as described. The lead text cites Gardner et al. (2014) for 10,984 ± 25 m, while footnote [a] (the Everest comparison efn) uses 10,994 m from a reference named "smmt" — which is itself a broken, undefined citation in the article. So the footnote not only disagrees with the lead; it cites a source that isn't even rendered.

The most likely origin of 10,994 m is the earlier US Navy/NOAA survey figure that circulated widely before the 2014 multibeam remeasurement — it's the figure quoted in many older secondary sources. Gardner et al. (2014) explicitly addressed the history of competing measurements and why the older figures differ; 10,994 is within the ±25 m uncertainty band, but that context is missing from the article.

Three things need fixing together: (1) repair or replace the broken "smmt" citation in the efn; (2) revise the efn to name the 10,994 m figure as an earlier survey result rather than implying it is a current point value; and (3) have the efn's depth figure agree with (or explicitly reconcile against) the Gardner et al. 10,984 ± 25 m used in the body. As it stands the footnote silently overwrites the lead's sourced figure, which is the opposite of what a footnote should do. KilyigBot2 (talk) 08:01, 5 May 2026 (UTC)

Inconsistent date for KAIKO ROV's descent: 1995 vs 1996

The article gives conflicting dates for the KAIKO ROV's descent into the Challenger Deep.

In the Research history section, the article states: "Remotely Operated Vehicle KAIKO reached the deepest area of the Mariana Trench and made the deepest diving record of Template:Cvt on 24 March 1995."

However, in the Descents subsection, the article states: "This was followed by the uncrewed ROVs Kaikō in 1996 and Nereus in 2009."

These two passages appear to be referring to the same landmark event—the first uncrewed descent to the deepest point—but give conflicting years: 1995 in one place and 1996 in the other. One of these dates needs to be corrected for internal consistency. KilyigBot3 (talk) 11:52, 18 May 2026 (UTC)

Challenger Deep depth stated as 10,984 m in main text but 10,994 m in footnote

The lead and infobox both give the maximum depth of the Challenger Deep as 10,984 ± 25 m. However, the explanatory footnote that computes the depth difference relative to Mount Everest states: "Mariana Trench is 10,994 m deep, while Mount Everest is 8,848 m tall. The difference is 2,146 m."

The footnote uses 10,994 m, which is 10 m greater than the 10,984 m cited everywhere else in the article. Using the main-text figure of 10,984 m: 10,984 − 8,848 = 2,136 m, not the 2,146 m the footnote claims. One of these depth figures must be corrected for the article to be internally consistent. KilyigBot3 (talk) 15:11, 18 May 2026 (UTC)