The Mariana Trench stone handset is a carved basalt object recovered from a sealed chamber just under 11,000 metres below the ocean surface. It stands 1.9 metres tall, weighs slightly less than 1.5 tonnes and closely reproduces the proportions of a mass-produced mobile telephone introduced in 1999. Its mineral display reflects light that is not present in the chamber, despite the absence of a cell, battery compartment or internal circuitry.[1]
Recovery site
The object was recovered from a sealed chamber at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. The chamber had remained unopened before the recovery. The account gives the depth as just under 11,000 metres and the surrounding pressure as approximately 1,100 atmospheres, describing the load as more than a tonne per square centimetre.
Only a few dozen people had reached that depth at the time of the account. Neither the recovery date nor the date at which the chamber was sealed is specified.
Material and construction
The body is basalt, carved rather than cast. Tool marks run in a single direction. The object measures 1.9 metres in height and has a mass slightly below 1.5 tonnes.
Its front face carries a screen, a keypad grid and two soft keys. The display is a worked mineral face with gold inlaid in lines approximately one millimetre wide. No cell, compartment for a cell or circuit of any kind is present inside the body.
Optical behavior
The display does not emit light. It reflects light that is absent from the chamber. The source of that light and the mechanism by which it is reflected remain unresolved.
Dimensional correspondence
The screen ratio, keypad grid, body taper and placement of the two soft keys match a commercial handset that went on sale in 1999 and sold more than 100 million units. The comparison is dimensional rather than a general visual resemblance.
When measurements of the object and a production handset are scaled against one another, fourteen dimensions agree to within two percent. The account describes this agreement as closer than that between two examples of the production phone. The commercial model is not named.
Unresolved origin
The correspondence is recorded as neither coincidental nor an homage. No direction of copying has been proposed: it remains undetermined whether the stone object reproduces the handset or the handset reproduces the object. The unopened condition of the chamber is central to that unresolved relationship.
References
- A giant stone phone was sealed in the Mariana TrenchPrimary article
Nanophage Research article retained with its accompanying original photograph and news plate. The recovery date, chamber sealing date and commercial handset model are not specified.