Our Vast and Beautiful Oceans

If you live near a coast or have been on a beach vacation, you’ve likely spent some time splashing and playing in the ocean. Whether you were swimming, surfing, or playing a game of Marco Polo, you were interacting with a great body of water that is home to some of the most amazing organisms known to mankind. The ocean makes up 70% of the Earth’s surface area, causing it to have major impacts on the environment at large. Learning about the ocean is important if you want to know more about the Earth and environment as a whole, as well as learning about conserving the ocean for future generations to use in years to come!

How Large is the Ocean?

The ocean contains over 1.3 billion cubic kilometers of water and makes up 99% of the worldwide area that is inhabited by organisms, making it essential for food webs and various habitats. The ocean is actually so large that it is divided into 5 basins, or smaller oceans; the Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Southern, and Arctic. These 5 basins make up one worldwide ocean that is larger in surface area than over 36 of the United States of America! In fact, if you were to take all of the water in the ocean and pile it on top of the United States, the water would stretch to be over 132 kilometers high. With all of that water, some might take advantage of it, or think that we have enough of it to waste, which isn’t true. Even though our ocean is large, it is important to protect and preserve. 

So, is the ocean just water? What cool features does it have?

While the ocean does contain a LOT of water, it also has many cool geographical features. The Earth’s longest mountain range, the Mid-Atlantic ridge, is 90% underwater and it stretches 40,389 miles. As the Earth’s tectonic plates push apart through their natural movement, new magma from under the Earth’s crust rises up to fill the gap between tectonic plates, causing the mountain range to become larger. Additionally, the ocean is home to the world’s deepest canyon, called the Mariana Trench. The Mariana Trench is located east of the Philippines in the Eastern Pacific ocean, and the deepest part of the Trench, called Challenger Deep, reaches about 7 miles underwater. Because of its incredible depth, only two people have ever descended into Challenger Deep, a brave and impressive feat. 

Why should we take care of the Ocean?

The ocean is home to 228,450 known species of organisms and likely millions more unknown species. Humans have been polluting and taking advantage of the ocean for years, and if we continue this behavior these species of organisms will be severely threatened and some may even go extinct. Many people throw trash in the ocean, misuse fishing lines, and overfish from certain parts of the ocean. This can kill certain animals, such as sea turtles, who mistake trash and fishing line for the food they normally eat. Also, overfishing can heavily disrupt food chains by taking sources of food from marine animals and using them as food for humans. In order to take care of the ocean for years to come, we must responsibly fish and be cognizant of where our trash goes. The ocean is vital to our lives and we must treat it as such. 

To wrap it all up, the ocean is vast, beautiful, and important to all living organisms on the planet. From the longest mountain range to the deepest trench, the ocean is home to many unique geographical and biological features. However, to preserve these parts of the ocean, we have to be careful to make sure garbage stays on land and out of the water. It is also important to fish responsibly, meaning that we should only take sustainable amounts of fish from the ocean. By doing this and many other simple measures, we can protect the ocean for many years to come. Next time you visit the coast and partake in a game of Marco Polo, remember all of the cool things the ocean has to offer us and do your part to take care of it!