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Atlantic Ocean is the youngest among all the oceans in the world. Go through the article to find some interesting and fun facts about Atlantic Ocean.
Atlantic Ocean is the second largest ocean in the world, next only to the Pacific Ocean. It is slightly less than 6.5 times the size of the US. The ocean separates Northern and Southern America from Europe and Africa. It is one of the busiest sea routes in the Western and Eastern Hemispheres. Apart from this, there are various other economic activities which are carried out in this ocean. If you want to know more about this ocean, explore the interesting and fun facts provided below.
Interesting & Fun Facts:
- Of all the world’s oceans, Atlantic Ocean is the youngest. It is believed to have been formed during the Jurassic Period.
- This ocean receives water from about half the world’s land area. Numerous rivers flow into the ocean.
- The name ‘Atlantic’ is derived from the legendary island of ‘Atlantis’, as described by Plato – one of the ancient writers.
- This ocean was the first ocean to be crossed by ship and airplane.
- In South Atlantic, there is a wide stretch of ocean between the tips of South Africa and South America, which causes huge waves & continuous strong winds, known as the “Roaring Forties”.
- The warm Gulf Stream of Atlantic Ocean keeps harbors in the Northern Europe away from ice, during winters.
- Sonar waves are used by scientists to map the floor of this ocean.
- Puerto Rico Trench is the deepest point in this ocean. It is about eight and a half thousand meters deep.
- The largest island in this ocean is Greenland.
- The Cancun reef of Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of Yucatan (Mexico), is the world’s second largest barrier reef, after the Great Barrier Reef of Australia.
- The first successful telegraph cable was laid under Atlantic Ocean in 1866, by The Great Eastern, the then world’s largest ship.
- In World War II, the Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth carried US troops across this ocean, to Europe.
- Concorde, the first supersonic flight, was across Atlantic Ocean only.
- In the winter storms of the Atlantic, waves can reach a great size and do untold damage to land.
- Atlantic Ocean causes the highest tides in the world, which occur in the Bay of Fundy, Canada, with a rise of around fifty feet in the spring tides.
- Atlantic Ridge, the underwater mountain range which runs 10,000 miles south from Iceland, is twice as wide as the Andes Mountains.
- Diamonds are scooped from the sea bed off the coast of Namibia, in southern Africa.
- A triangular area in Atlantic Ocean, called The Bermuda Triangle, is held responsible for mysterious shipwrecks, disappearances and air crashes.
- It was in 1919 that the first non stop flight to Atlantic Ocean was taken by John Alcock and Arthur Brown. The journey was completed in sixteen and a half hours.
- In 1928, Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly across the Atlantic.
- It was during 1850s that the Cunard Line began carrying passengers across the Atlantic.
- Titanic, the largest ship in the world – when she was built and said to be unsinkable, sank in Atlantic Ocean in 1912, after being hit by an iceberg on her maiden voyage to America.
- In 1938, a coelacanth, a type of fish that first appeared in the sea some 300 million years ago, was caught alive by the fishermen off the Southern coast of Africa. These fishes were thought to be extinct for more than 60 million years.
- French Emperor Napoleon, after losing the Battle of Trafalgar, was exiled to St. Helena in this ocean.
