1. The Ocean
In truth, we have only seen 5 percent of the ocean. The
remaining 95 percent is yet to be explored which begs
the question: what have we yet to discover? It is said
that we know more about the surface of Mars and the
moon then we do about the ocean floor. Why? People
just aren’t interested. What influences people to
explore is the undiscovered sea life that we have no
knowledge of. However, a lot of money has to be
invested into ocean projects, because of how difficult it
is to travel underwater. Especially when it means
funding the resources for technology to transport
people safely, which is quite unrealistic because of the
increasing pressure underwater.
The ocean does not only hold value to the creatures
that inhabit it but also to life, as a whole. This might be
hard to believe because, at the same time, the ocean is
having a dramatic effect on land and our future.
However, without the ocean, we wouldn’t have the
regulating weather that we do. We also wouldn’t have a
circulating temperature, which would ultimately change
human life as we know it.
Although we are dependent on the ocean, many
innocent lives have been taken. The best and most
famous example being the Titanic which hit a gigantic
iceberg and broke in half. However, the Titanic hasn’t
been the only wreckage. In fact, there are plenty more
2. ships that have been made victim to the mysterious
blue depths.
They say that the ocean is the biggest museum because
it holds more historical artefacts than that of our
museums on land. For example, many sunken cities
caused by earthquakes lie at quite shallow depths. This
is because of how close to the shore this wreckage was,
unlike the Titanic which was in the middle of the ocean
and was on a path straight to the bottom.
Unfortunately, because the ocean is an astounding
10,994 meters deep, we are unable to easily access such
artefacts from shipwrecks. However, some still lie at
shallow levels which is how they have been discovered.
https://ed.ted.com/lessons/how-much-of-human-
history-is-on-the-bottom-of-the-ocean-peter-
campbell#digdeeper
The ocean has such a depth that, every year, more
species are discovered. Currently, there are roughly
700,000 to 1 million species living in our oceans. That’s
estimated to be only one third, leaving a remaining 2
million that we have yet to find. This number is growing
as technology is advancing and people are finding new
ways to search the ocean floor. However, this shouldn’t
come as a shock because the ocean makes up to 70% of
the earth’s surface.
3. https://www.seeker.com/two-thirds-marine-species-
remain-unknown-1766300637.html
Although the ocean possesses a beauty and is quite the
sight to see for tourists especially, it’s also a wasteland
as a cause of pollution. With every minute, a garbage
truck’s worth of rubbish is dumped into our oceans. At
the rate, we are going, this will increase to two per
minute by 2030 and then 4 per minute by 2050 which
means there could be more plastic than fish in the
oceans.
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/10/every-
minute-one-garbage-truck-of-plastic-is-dumped-into-
our-oceans/
Oil also gets dumped in to our oceans daily. As a result,
the polluted areas of sea are slowly but surely turning
into acid. It is not only vital for sea life but also for us
humans that the ocean stays as clean as possible. Not
only will the sea life die out if the ocean eventually just
turns into acid but the weather will be affected as well.
This can be very dangerous because of the amounts of
rain the world gets. Obviously, plants feed on rain water
which is slowly but surely becoming more acidic and
could potentially be deadly for trees as well as plants. Of
course, we also need trees to regulate the oxygen levels
for our survival.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_acidification
4. Along with oil, plastic pollution has become an
increasing problem. One thing that us people don’t
really realise is that this is affecting us in the long run.
Underwater life is ingesting large amounts of this, even
at the lowest depths. It has been found that plastic
remnants have been traced in the water below an
astounding 10,000 meters, where even fish who are
part of our food chain lie. If those fish have plastic in
their systemand they are part of the chain, they can
affect the rest of the chain. That includes us as we eat a
lot of fish containing even mere particles. So technically,
we might as well also be eating plastic.
Birds have also been effected by the plastic, whilst
scrounging for food. It’s estimated that 1.5 million
Laysan Albatrosses, on the Midway Atoll in Hawaii, have
plastic in their digestive systemand a third of the chicks
that hatch is prone to death because of the plastic
consumption. Onlookers have been graced with the
unwanted sight of bird skeletons filled with plastic,
consisting of reds, pinks, browns and blues which could
potentially resemble fish that they feed on.
http://plastic-pollution.org
Waste isn’t the only increasing problem. Global
warming is a never-ending process, ultimately leading
all human life to extinction. There have been methods
to decrease emissions, however, we have had no
5. indication of a major breakthrough for an alternative
power source. Of course, we do have things such as
solar power and wind power etc. but there’s no
guarantee that any of these will work, all the time, and
they aren’t at the most affordable price.
The ice is melting which not only has an effect on life
surrounded by ice but also human life because ocean
levels are rising and continents are getting smaller.
Melting glaciers, ice caps and ice sheets have all
contributed approximately half the total of global
increase in sea levels, between 1972 to 2008. However,
recent studies found that melting ice added nearly half
an inch of sea levels between 2003 to 2007 which put
the contribution up to about 80% during that time.
https://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_i
mpacts/impacts/infographic-sea-level-rise-global-
warming.html#.Wp0PQLGcai4
The species that has been strongly affected by human
life is the turtles. This is not only due to rising
temperatures but also because of urbanisation. More
and more holiday destinations are building on beaches
to capture that fantasy experience (like you see on the
adverts), however, this has had a dramatic effect on
mothering turtles. With more and more humans, turtles
are less inclined to lay their eggs on beaches because
it’s too light and too loud. This results in turtles laying
6. their eggs not in the best atmospheres and gives the
eggs a lesser chance of hatching and surviving.
https://conserveturtles.org/information-sea-turtles-
threats-artificial-lighting/
The underwater waterfall is one of the many
phenomenal wonders of the ocean, found in Mauritius.
Although it might not be on the list of the seven
wonders, it is still definitely something to go and see.
However, what you are seeing is not actually a waterfall
but in fact is just part of an optical illusion.
Disappointing, right? That doesn’t stop tourists from all
around the world coming just to see the waterfalls,
which is said to be better seen from a helicopter or
airplane.
Everybody has of course heard about the Great Barrier
Reef based in Australia. This is one of the largest
consisting of around 2,900 smaller reefs spread over
2,600km along Queensland. This is one of the biggest
attractions in the world, simply because of how
colourful it appears to be. These reefs are also some of
the most diverse, visible to the human eye, because of
the various species that inhabit the coral beds.
Going back to artefacts, one of the most pivotal
historical events lies largely beneath the ocean. The
kingdom of which Cleopatra was based is now
completely immersed in water, as it has been for the
7. past 1,200 years. The city is called Heracleion and was
known to be the gateway into Egypt during the reign of
Cleopatra.
https://exploredia.com/top-10-most-beautiful-places-
under-the-ocean/
The ocean is split into five, consisting of the Atlantic,
Pacific, Indian, Arctic and Antarctic. This was originally
just the four oceans, besides the latter, because it
wasn’t actually recognized as one. The Pacific, Atlantic
and Indian are known as the three major because they
are the three largest.
Mariana Trench, the deepest part of the ocean, is in the
Pacific Ocean. The very deepest recorded is the
Challenger Deep at 10,994 meters. Since 1960, when
two scientists decided to venture down for the first
time, only 3 people have successfully travelled to the
bottom of the ocean. The third one was actually film
director James Cameron, who travelled down in 2012
(52 years later). The reason behind this is because the
water pressure, at this depth, is extremely high to the
point where it’s equal to 100 elephants standing on your
head.
http://mentalfloss.com/article/90796/8-surprising-
facts-about-deepest-part-ocean
8. Besides the fact that there is a lot of information about
the ocean here, we have still yet to explore the rest.
Who knows what we will discover in that 95% if we
already have all this knowledge?
