The expanse of ocean between Georgia and Virginia is subtly amazing. From the surface, it appears to be just another expanse of dark Atlantic water, unremarkable, a little choppy in the fall, the kind of sea you fly over mindlessly. However, beneath it, coral forests, methane seeps, and ecosystems that scientists are just starting to comprehend stretch along the continental shelf and spill into deep submarine canyons. To begin assembling the picture, a fleet of research ships, federal robots, and almost five years of coordinated fieldwork were required. DEEP SEARCH, which stands for Deep Sea Exploration to Advance Research on…
Author: Derrick Lester
Derrick Lester
Derrick Lester is a professor and editor at indeep-project.org. His academic career has been molded by a single, enduring obsession: the sea and all life in it. Drawing from marine biology, oceanography, and the kind of hard-won field knowledge that only comes from spending significant time on and under the water, Derrick's writing has the depth of a scholar thanks to his years of research and teaching experience. His writing delves into the science of marine life with the inquisitiveness of someone who has never fully moved past the wonder of what exists beneath the surface. Derrick hopes to introduce readers to a world that encompasses over 70% of the planet and is, in many respects, still largely unexplored through his contributions to indeep-project.org.
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In 1980, the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act was signed into law. After a brief period of use, primarily for a few exploration permits granted during the Reagan administration, it lay dormant, uncontested, and gathering bureaucratic dust for forty years. Nobody gave it much thought. The International Seabed Authority was established, UNCLOS went into effect, and the United States discreetly stayed out of it all. Because no one was serious enough about deep-sea mining to test it, this arrangement persisted for years. It’s the end of that quiet time. The Metals Company filed within days to mine 65,000 square…
Scientists are anxious about a certain type of confidence. Not the audacious self-assurance of someone who has thoroughly researched an issue and reached a thoughtful conclusion. The confidence of someone who has simply concluded that waiting is no longer an option is the other type. That is essentially the stance that the US government is currently adopting regarding the Pacific Ocean’s bottom, and it merits much closer examination than it is receiving at the moment. Erik Noble, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Oceans and Atmosphere at NOAA, was remarkably open about the situation when he spoke earlier this month at…
The numbers cease to make sense when you attempt to visualize the bottom of the Mariana Trench. Eleven kilometers below. Eight tons of pressure are applied to each square inch. It was completely dark, with temperatures barely above freezing. The human brain almost immediately rejects this type of environment as being uninhabitable, but there are living things down there. not merely getting by. flourishing. Scientists’ preconceived notions about the limits of life have been subtly rearranged by the results of NOAA’s ongoing investigation of the Mariana Trench. The deepest part of the ocean, below 6,000 meters, is known as the…
Something remarkable is spinning off the coast of Yangjiang, about 70 kilometers out into the South China Sea. Most buildings you’ve ever stood next to are not as tall as this one. A circle larger than two football fields arranged end to end is swept by its blades. Additionally, it simply floats on water that is so deep that no one is bothering to try to bolt anything to the bottom. On May 2, China Three Gorges Corporation finished installing the Three Gorges Pilot. The numbers associated with this machine are the kind that require some time to process. 16…
On May 1st, the season began. It ended on June 7th. After 37 days of recreational snowy grouper fishing in federal waters in the South Atlantic, there was silence. The closure wasn’t particularly shocking to anyone keeping an eye on what’s been going on beneath the Atlantic’s surface. However, there is a weight that is hard to ignore when it comes this early and decisively. Around that early June date, NOAA Fisheries estimated that recreational landings would reach the 2026 annual catch limit of 1,713 fish, prompting the announcement of the closure. Not the following month. Not by the end…
One of India’s busiest appellate courts, surrounded by piles of paper, legal briefs, and tax codes that no one outside the profession willingly reads, is where a dispute over what occurs miles beneath the ocean’s surface eventually made its way. This is a unique kind of irony. That’s essentially what happened with Western Geco International Ltd., a business whose Gurugram project office was conducting seismic surveys in deep water to gather geological data offshore, which is technically unglamorous. Regarding the legal implications of that work, the service tax authorities had different opinions. The case, which was heard by the Principal…
Hurricane season brings with it a certain kind of dread—not the storm itself, but the hours leading up to it, when you watch the forecast cone change on your screen and wonder how accurate any of it is. Most people believe that the best data is somewhere. They believe the system is operational. That assumption needs to be seriously examined right now. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has spent decades developing what many meteorologists believe to be the world’s most advanced weather forecasting infrastructure, including ocean buoys sending live data from the Atlantic, satellites measuring ocean temperatures, and weather…
The idea that parts of the Pacific seafloor, which are so far away and so dark that most people will never be able to see them, are being put up for auction this summer seems a little surreal. Not in a far-off future. this summer. And perhaps all the way through autumn. That is the current state of affairs in Washington, where the Trump administration is acting at a rate that has shocked even those who anticipated swift action. President Trump issued an executive order in April of last year with the goal of creating a deep-sea mining sector virtually…
A fisherman named Thanh hauls in his nets on a calm morning along the Vietnamese coast and discovers that they are lighter than they have been in years. He has been venturing farther—perilously farther—and returning with less. He can figure out why without a satellite report. A few weeks ago, he saw the big ships sail by, their lights flickering on the horizon like a city moving slowly. The water felt different by the time they were gone. Emptier. This is not a singular incident. Small-scale fishermen are complaining about the same thing throughout Southeast Asia, from the Gulf of…