Floor Of The Pacific Ocean

Be careful when interpreting this diagram and others like it because in order to show the various features clearly the vertical axis is exaggerated in this case by about 200 times.

Floor of the pacific ocean.

An underwater survey has found thousands of small round divots scooped out of the soft sediment on the seafloor. The following features are shown at example depths to scale though each feature has a considerable range at which it may occur. A massive circular structure has been spotted slowly crawling across the pacific sea floor 3000 feet below the surface. The oldest pacific ocean floor is only around 180 ma old with older crust subducted by now.

The trenches around the edges of the eastern pacific ocean are shallower than are those of the western pacific. The region has this name because it is the world s largest area of volcanism and earthquakes. Its area excluding adjacent seas encompasses about 63 8 million square miles. The mariana trench the world s deepest submarine de pression is more than 11 000m below sea level in some parts about 7 000m below the mean depth of the ocean floor.

There s a mystery lurking in the pacific ocean just off the coast of big sur california. Currently the oldest known pacific ocean floor is about 180 million years old. The average depth is about 3 800 metres 12 467 ft the challenger deep in the marina trench which is located to the west of the philippines and north of new guinea is the deepest point in the pacific ocean with 10 920m 35 827ft. A topographic profile of the pacific ocean floor between japan and british columbia is shown in figure 18 3.

How deep is the pacific ocean the pacific is not only the biggest but also the deepest ocean with the deepest trenches. In terms of its geology the area encompassing the pacific ocean is sometimes called the pacific ring of fire. The pacific ocean was born 750 million years ago at the breakup of rodinia although it is generally called the panthalassic ocean until the breakup of pangea about 200 million years ago. The pacific ocean evolved in the mesozoic from the panthalassic ocean which had formed when rodinia rifted apart around 750 ma the first ocean floor which is part of the current pacific plate began 160 ma to the west of the central pacific and subsequently developed into the largest oceanic plate on earth.

This graphic shows several ocean floor features on a scale from 0 35 000 feet below sea level.