(CNN) Honolulu – The filmmaker reached Challenger Deep, which is part of the Mariana Trench in the western Pacific Ocean, near Guam, at 7:52 a.m. Monday (5:52 p.m. ET Sunday), said Ellen Stanley, a spokeswoman for the National Geographic Society that is working with Cameron on the project.
At more than 10,900 meters (about 35,800 feet), the Mariana Trench is deeper than Mount Everest is tall. And it has had only two previous human visitors: U.S. Navy Lt. Don Walsh and late Swiss explorer Jacques Piccard who descended to that spot in 1960.
