Interesting FACTS about Ocean – The pressure at the deepest point in the ocean is approximately equivalent of one person trying to support 50 jumbo jets.
An ocean (from Greek Ὠκεανὸς, “okeanos” Oceanus[1]) is a major body of saline water, and a principal component of the hydrosphere. Approximately 71% of the Earth’s surface (~3.61 X 1014 m2) is covered by ocean, a continuous body of water that is customarily divided into several principal oceans and smaller seas.
Now some interesting facts about OCEAN:
- Sharks attack some 50-75 people each year worldwide, with perhaps 8-12 fatalities, according to data compiled in the International Shark Attack File (ISAF). Although shark attacks get a lot of attention, this is far less than the number of people killed each year by elephants, bees, crocodiles, lightning or many other natural dangers. On the other side of the ledger, we kill somewhere between 20-100 million sharks every year through fishing activities.
- According to World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) there are currently 199,146 named marine species.
- The oceans cover 71% of the Earth’s surface and contain 97% of the Earth’s water.
- 90% of all volcanic activity occurs in the oceans.
- The speed of sound in water is 1,435 m/sec – nearly five times faster than the speed of sound in air.
- The highest tides in the world are at the Bay of Fundy, which separates New Brunswick from Nova Scotia. At some times of the year the difference between high and low tide is 16.3 m, taller than a three-story building.
- The pressure at the deepest point in the ocean is more than 11,318 tons/sq m, or the equivalent of one person trying to support 50 jumbo jets.
- The lowest known point on Earth, called the Challenger Deep, is 11,034 m deep, in the Marianas Trench in the western Pacific. To get an idea of how deep that is, if you could take Mt. Everest and place it at the bottom of the trench there would still be over a mile of ocean above it. The Dead Sea is the Earth’s lowest land point with an elevation of 396 m below sea level.
- The Pacific Ocean, the world’s largest water body, occupies a third of the Earth’s surface. The Pacific contains about 25,000 islands (more than the total number in the rest of the world’s oceans combined), almost all of which are found south of the equator. The Pacific covers an area of 179.7 million sq km.
- Antarctica has as much ice as the Atlantic Ocean has water.