The beach isn’t where America ends. Underwater, the continental shelf extends for miles, and the U.S. has jurisdiction over 5 million square miles of ocean floor. This includes everything from Alaska’s Arctic waters to small Pacific islands that were claimed in the 1850s because of bird droppings.
Read more: America’s Underwater Territory
Areas within 100 km (62 mi) of oceans compared to areas closer to the Kármán line where space begins. 99% of atmospheric mass sits below 30 km (19 mi) while Earth measures 12,742 km (7,918 mi) across. Troposphere holds 85-90% of atmospheric mass in just 8-20 km.
Read more: Are You Closer to the Sea or to Outer Space?
The Panama Canal one of the most fantastic engineering wonders of the modern world, connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. About 14 thousand vessels use the Canal each year. More than one million ships have passed through the Panama Canal since it opened.
Read more: The Panama Canal mapped
If all the ice covering Antarctica, Greenland, (Antarctica would make about 60 meters of sea-level rise, Greenland about 60 meters) and in mountain ice caps around the globe were to melt, sea level would rise about 70 meters (230 feet) and cover all seaside cities.
Read more: The world with a 70 meters sea-level rise
We know that the world ocean is bottomless and that the deepest trench in the world has almost 11 kilometers. We also know that the world ocean covers about 70 percent of our planet, making more than 2/3 of Earth’s surface unseen to us. But assume we obtained a way to drain oceans of our world, what would Earth’s exterior look like, exactly?
Read more: What Earth Would Look Like If All The Oceans Were Drained
The Mariana Trench is the deepest oceanic trench on Earth. It reaches about 36,070 feet (10,994 meters) at the Challenger Deep. To put this into perspective, if Mount Everest, the highest point on Earth, was placed at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, its peak would still be over a mile underwater.
Read more: Lakes and ocean depth comparison
Explore the Spilhaus projection, a fascinating world map that places the oceans at the center, revealing their crucial role in Earth’s ecosystem. Compare with the Dymaxion projection for a new perspective on our planet.”
By exploring these diverse world map projections, we gain a deeper understanding of our planet’s geography and the critical role of the world’s oceans in sustaining life.
Read more: Discovering the World Ocean with the Spilhaus Projection
An animated map shows what would happen if you pulled a 10-meter plug in the Mariana Trench. Over 158,180 years, the Atlantic and Indian Oceans become landlocked while the Pacific keeps draining toward the deepest point on Earth.
Read more: What happens when you pull the plug on the Marianas TrenchMajor drainage basins: Atlantic Ocean (about 48.7 percent of all world’s land drains to this ocean) Arctic Ocean (drainage basin
Read more: Global drainage areas
The sea level has increased 15 to 20 cm (6 to 8 inches) in the latest 100 years. The process of raising the water level of the world’s oceans continues. If all the ice on our planet were to melt, the sea level would rise about 70 m (230 ft).
Read more: If the polar ice caps completely melted