Google Ocean has spurred some serious debate with users who are pondering how an enigmatic and alien-like grid formation found off the coast of Morocco came about.
Despite the many theories that this pattern was indeed from extraterrestrials or was the outline of the mysterious city of Atlantis, Google has put those rumors to rest, contesting that this bizarre pattern was merely formed by ships performing sonar surveys of the ocean floor.
The lines, dubbed "ship tracks," are caused by echosounding, explained Google, a process in which sound waves are created by the boat, which then move down towards the bottom of the ocean hit the ocean floor and bounce back to be reheard by the ship. The amount of time it takes for the sound to travel from the liner and back again tells scientists how deep the ocean is at that point. Less romantic than discovering a lost city but realistic enough for Google users to accept. To prove it was not a ploy to cover up classified Area-51 information, the search engine gave readers a similar photograph of ship tracks that can be seen off the coast of Hawaii.
Still, Google Ocean has opened the doors to at home expedition and education. Particularly interesting discoveries are a new island being formed by volcanic activity within the Hawaiian Islands, which has already been named Loihi Seamount. Just as interesting are the tectonic plates that form the mid-Atlantic Ridge, an underwater mountain range formed by plate movement that stretches over 37,500 miles long, which can be seen via Ocean moving noticeably apart.
In order to fully understand and explore the relatively unexplored depths of the ocean, Google has proposed that scientists graph the sea bottom more precisely by using ships and echosounding technology. Google reported that the U.S. Navy has researched this idea and found that it would take 200 ship hours and $2 billion total. (We should mention that Google suggested this idea light-heartedly, with no intention of being taken too seriously).
As for Atlantis, Google reported that satellites would not be sufficient in finding the lost city's whereabouts due to the fact that man-made structures are not big enough to catch from a view from space. Still, Google users are still earnestly searching the ocean for more mysteries left to be explained by the all-seeing and all-knowing Google.
