14 Facts About Atlantic Ocean
- The name 'Atlantic' is derived from the legendary island of 'Atlantis', as described by Plato - one of the ancient writers.
- Atlantic Ocean is the second largest ocean in the world, next only to the Pacific Ocean.
- Atlantic Ocean was the first ocean to be crossed by ship and airplane.
- Atlantic Ocean receives water from about half the world's land area. Numerous rivers flow into the ocean.
- Puerto Rico Trench is the deepest point in Atlantic Ocean. It is about eight and a half thousand meters deep.
- The warm Gulf Stream of Atlantic Ocean keeps harbors in the Northern Europe away from ice, during winters.
- Concorde, the first supersonic flight, was across Atlantic Ocean only.
- The largest island in Atlantic Ocean is Greenland.
- Atlantic Ridge, the underwater mountain range which runs 10,000 miles south from Iceland, is twice as wide as the Andes Mountains.
- 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.
- In 1928, Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly across the Atlantic.
- A triangular area in Atlantic Ocean, called The Bermuda Triangle, is held responsible for mysterious shipwrecks, disappearances and air crashes.
- 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.
- It was during 1850s that the Cunard Line began carrying passengers across the Atlantic.
