Earth

Enormous underwater mountains discovered off west coast of Americas

An ocean research vessel has just discovered four underwater mountains, the tallest almost 3 kilometres high, that might be hotspots of deep-sea life

By Sofia Quaglia

8 February 2024

The second of four seamounts recently discovered by the team on Schmidt Ocean Institute — One of the four recently discovered seamounts
Schmidt Ocean Institute

Four new underwater mountains have been discovered in the high seas off the west coast of South and Central America.

“The tallest is over one-and-a-half miles in height, and we didn’t really know it was there,” says Jyotika Virmani at the Schmidt Ocean Institute in California.

A radical new theory rewrites the story of how life on Earth began

Virmani’s team on the exploration vessel Falkor (too) came across the seamounts in January, while navigating from Costa Rica to Chile for an…

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Enormous underwater mountains discovered off west coast of Americas

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