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Week 6
Our Water Walking Continues
In week 6, we continue our journey across the vast Atlantic Ocean. We are making excellent progress and due to the constancy of scenery, we have the ability to learn more about the water that lies below us.
Atlantic Ocean Trivia
The word ’Atlantic ’ originates from the Greek mythology meaning ‘Sea of Atlas’. Atlas was the titan who had to stand on the edge of the earth and carry the heavens on his shoulders as punishment from Zeus as Atlas had fought against the Olympian gods for the control of the heavens.
The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's oceans, with an area of about 106,460,000 km². It covers approximately 20 percent of Earth's surface and about 29 percent of its water surface area. It separates the "Old World" from the "New World". The average depth of the Atlantic Ocean is about 3,339 metres/10,955 ft. The Atlantic ocean is the saltiest of the world’s oceans.
The Atlantic Ocean is also home to the planet’s longest mountain range and its tallest waterfall. The Mid-Adtlantic Ridge is an underwater (also called submarine) mountain range which extends roughly from Iceland in the north to South Georgia and South Sandwich Island south of Argentina. It is the longest mountain range on the planet measuring four times the length of other major mountain ranges including the Andes and the Himalayas.
The Denmark Strait cataract is more than 3 times the height of Angel Falls in Venezuela, which is considered Earth’s tallest waterfall (on land). And the Denmark Strait cataract carries an estimated 123 million cubic feet (3.5 million cubic meters) of water per second. That’s equivalent to almost 2,000 Niagara Falls at peak flow.
Creatures of the Deep
The Mid Atlantic ridge is home for all sorts of interesting sea life living in the depths of the Atlantic. The fascinating bioluminescent octopus emits a blue-green light from its suckers. The octopus has the ability to turn the lights on and off to either scare off predators or lure in small crustaceans.
Porcupine crabs typically make their way over the muddy bottom. This prickly relative of the Alaska king crab is found in small numbers in northeast ocean waters.
By waving their many weaponized arms in the water, brisingid seastars catch small zooplankton to feed on.
There's Gold in Them Thar Waters
In search of gold so you can dramatically increase your church pledge? The oceans are a good place to look, however, it's not as easy as panning for gold. Ocean waters around the world contain about 20 million tons of gold in them.
Based on today's spot price of gold at $62.50 USD per gram, that amount of gold would be worth over $1 Quadrillion USD. However, there's the monumental task of removing the gold from vast amounts of seawater. Each liter of water would contain approximately 13 billionths of a gram of gold. Currently, there's no cost-effective method to remove the gold from seawater and be profitable. However, that didn't stop many eager inventors and investors both legitimate and scammers. In the 1890s, pastor Ford Jernegan came up with a plan for a "Gold Accumulator" in a fever dream. The plan was to extract gold from the Long Island Sound using a process involving mercury and electricity treatments.
Jernegan started the Electrolytic Marine Salts Company and convinced enough wealthy investors to raise $1 million (about $26 million in today's dollars) in cash. The company was off and running, building a large gold-extraction operation in Lubec, Maine, far away from the watchful eyes of their investors. By 1898 investors began asking questions and wanting evidence the plant worked. Shortly thereafter Jernegan disappeared with cash in hand and leaving behind a useless contraption.
Another source of treasure in the ocean is just that...Treasure. Shipwrecker hunter Sean Fisher estimates that the total value of sunken treasure in the oceans is over $60 billion USD, much of it in the Atlantic. Fisher specializes in finding Spanish vessels that sank while toting gold, silver, and other loot from the Americas to Europe. And the Spaniards, Fisher says, kept records in triplicate, allowing modern-day shipwreck hunters to see the preserved ship manifests. Those manifests reveal an incredible amount of wealth crossing the ocean, and occasionally sinking into it. For about 300 years, the Spaniards came over here and stole all of the wealth of the Americas," Fisher says. "They would lose about 10 percent of that as the cost of doing business. Several wrecks out there by themselves are worth several billion dollars."
Recent big shipwreck discoveries include the Port Nicholson, a World War II–era British merchant ship found 50 miles off the coast of Maine, says it bore 71 tons of platinum ingots worth about $3 billion. Other shipwreck hunters turned up the HMS Victory, which sank in the English Channel in 1744 with a "secret" cargo of gold valued at $1 billion. And, in an episode that shows the high stakes of shipwreck salvaging, Spain is currently recovering the estimated $500 million haul of gold and silver from the Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes that sank in 1804; an American company found the ship but lost court cases to Spain over the rights to the treasure.
We covered 712 miles this week, a 30% improvement over Week 5. We still have 671 miles to cover before we can stand on land again. Let’s set our sights on making land this week as this endless bobbing up and down is starting to grow old. Squinting far off on the eastern horizon, we can almost make out a lighthouse beckoning our arrival. If we can get everyone to cover and submit their miles this week, we’ll be on land again in no time. At this pace, we are on track to get to Bethlehem by Christmas, but we cannot let up now, particularly in the middle of an ocean. Let’s keep it up and encourage other members to join us!