The Seven Underwater Wonders of the World
The Deep Sea Vents
In the blackness of night, on a remote part of the planet, a volcano erupts. Thick plumes of what looks like black smoke billow from it. Escaping magma blankets the terrain; temperatures soar to more than 600o F. deep cracks formed around the volcano, and superheated water seeps from them. Local residents do not evacuate [...]
Lake Baikal
In early March, snow still blankets lake Baikal, its deep waters sealed beneath three-foot-thick ice. Over the next two months, under bright springtime sun, the ice will slowly thaw in a process punctuated by cracking sounds not unlike the sharp report of guns. As long as the ice remains in place, though, scientists can set [...]
The Northern Red Sea
Surrounded by one of the world’s largest expanses of sand, the Red Sea laps the shores of an ecosystem seemingly devoid of life. For that reason, many people find it difficult to imagine that some of the earth’s richest coral reefs rise from the floor of the sea’s northern reaches. Marine scientist Eugenie Clark has [...]
The Galapagos Islands
Rising from the Pacific 600 miles west of Ecuador are arid islands whose name, for obvious reasons, is a Spanish word for tortoises. Indeed, the Galapagos islands are famous for tortoises weighing hundreds of pounds. What many people don’t know, though, is that fascinating creatures also live in an undersea realm offshore. Describing the contrast [...]
Palau
The warm waters of Palau, a small archipelago in the Pacific Ocean, hold perhaps the richest and most biologically diverse coral reefs on the planet. In this “cradle of diversity,” marine biologists have recorded 700 species of corals and 1,500 species of fish. Palau’s coral reefs began to grow millions of years ago when coral [...]
The Seven Underwater Wonders of the World
A noted marine explorer named Jacques-Yves Cousteau wrote: “It is all strange, unearthly, and yet familiar. Strange because the sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonders forever.” Diving is becoming a much more popular sport as humans become more fascinated with the diverse ecosystems of the deep. Coral reefs, [...]
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