New Estimates Say Earth's Oceans Smaller Than Once Believed 263
Velcroman1 writes with this snippet from Fox News: "Using lead weights and depth sounders, scientists have made surprisingly accurate estimates of the ocean's depths in the past. Now, with satellites and radar, researchers have pinned down a more accurate answer to that age-old query: How deep is the ocean? And how big? As long ago as 1888, John Murray dangled lead weights from a rope off a ship to calculate the ocean's volume — the product of area and mean ocean depth. Using satellite data, researchers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute set out to more accurately answer that question — and found out that it's 320 million cubic miles. And despite miles-deep abysses like the Mariana Trench, the ocean's mean depth is just 2.29 miles, thanks to the varied and bumpy ocean floor."
Well it was more volumous... (Score:5, Funny)
Well, it was more volumous. But all those sponges soaked up so much.
Re:What were the earlier estimates? (Score:4, Funny)
I wonder if you need to correct for the oil if you use the Gulf of Mexico units. Or perhaps it just counts for that date.
Re:How about some metric figures? (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, but that's meaningless to most people, it's a VLN without context. For all you fans of real, visceral numbers you can relate to, that volume (1.33 x 10^9 km^3) is approximately equal to the amount of water in the earth's oceans.
Hope that helps you to understand the magnitude of the number. Glad to be of service.
Re:What were the earlier estimates? (Score:3, Funny)
Paging Captain Nemo (Score:4, Funny)
2.29 miles isn't even 1 league! I thought the ocean was 20,000 leagues deep!
Mark my words (Score:1, Funny)
Global warming? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:What were the earlier estimates? (Score:4, Funny)
About 12 million football fields worth.
Re:Global warming? (Score:3, Funny)
Have Al Gore hop in the water at Coney Island and the global sea level will rise 26.58mm.
Re:I estimate (Score:5, Funny)
Government didn't force them to drill there (Score:1, Funny)
To be fair, government didn't force them to drill there. It disallowed drilling in some locations so the company evaluated risks and decided to drill there.
Now that we know how well they do evaluating risks, I am rather pleased that government put some restrictions on their drilling. Because it is clear that they choose a risk of a massive catastrophe if they believe that there are profits involved and can't be trusted in this matter. I just wish that the government(s) would have put much more restrictions in place.
Re:I estimate (Score:3, Funny)
* ducks *
Re:How about some metric figures? (Score:3, Funny)
Well, if you put all the water after each other, it would reach from here to the moon and back. maybe that helps us grasp such a big number...