Fascinating Facts on the World Sea

• Oceans cover more than 70% of the Earth’s surface.
• With so much of the Earth’s surface taken up by the World Ocean, it’s evident how vital these marine environments are to the planet, and how much there still is to be explored.
• The world’s oceans contain enough water to fill a cube with edges over 1,000 kilometres in length.
• The area of the World Ocean is about 361.9 million square kilometres and its volume is approximately 1,335 billion cubic kilometres.
• The Mariana Trench is the deepest known area of Earth’s oceans. It has the deepest point of around 11 kilometres.
• The Mariana Trench is located to the east of the Mariana Islands in the western Pacific Ocean. More people have been to the moon than to the Mariana Trench. Just 3 people have managed to make it to the Mariana Trench, because of the extreme conditions there.
• The largest ocean on the Earth is the Pacific Ocean, covering around 30% of the Earth’s surface.
• It covers around 30% of the Earth’s surface. The name “Pacific Ocean” comes from the Latin name Tepre Pacificum, meaning “peaceful sea”. At its widest point, from Indonesia all the way to Colombia, the Pacific Ocean is wider (almost 20,000 km) by more than 5 times the diameter of the Moon.
• The world’s longest mountain chain is underwater, with a total length of 65,000 km.
• Earth’s longest chain of mountains, the Mid-Ocean Ridge, is almost entirely beneath the ocean, stretching across a distance of 65,000 kilometres. It’s said that this mountain chain is less explored than the surface of Venus or Mars.
• The ocean is home to 94% of all life.
• As so much of the Earth’s surface is underwater, it comes as no surprise that marine species outnumber those on land. But, it’s an incredible 94% of the Earth’s living species that exist within the oceans. That means those of us who live on land are part of a very, very small minority.
• Less than 5% of the oceans have been explored.
• Man has explored less than five per cent of the Earth’s oceans. As researchers strive to discover more, we’re continually getting to know our oceans better.
• We still only know a fraction of the marine species in our oceans.
• According to the World Register of Marine Species, there are now 240,470 accepted species, but this is believed to be just a small proportion of the species that exist, with new marine life being discovered every day.
• The world’s largest living structure – the Great Barrier Reef, with a total length of 2,600 km, is visible from space.
• Measuring around 2,600 km, it can even be seen even from the Moon!
• Over 70% of our planet’s oxygen is produced by the ocean’s living organisms.
• It’s thought that between 70 and 80 per cent of the oxygen we breathe is produced by marine plants, nearly all of which are marine algae.

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