Second massive “blue hole” found, 270 metres deep
popularmechanics.com
popularmechanics.com
The major axis of the TJBH at ~10 mbsl was estimated to be ~151.8 m and was oriented ~10.76° clockwise from the north, similar to the main direction of geological faults in the region. The minor axis, perpendicular to the major axis, was ~124.4 m across. The surface area covered by the blue hole is ~13,690 m2 (1.4 ha) with an external perimeter of ~492.7 m. The structure of the blue hole can be described as a conic shape that is north-skewed with a volume of ~1 million m3.
Why not about 140m (450 ft) diameter?
The full open access article is here:
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2023.1141...
Edit: Actually for a much easier visual, it's right about 2.5 American football fields.
One that means absolutely nothing to the majority of the people on the planet.
I only included "American" because I knew someone would jump on it with soccer/non-American football fields.
There is no such thing as "soccer". The correct name is "football", because you use your feet to move the ball inside the field during the game.
There is also American football, which is an entirely different game, that's neither played with feet, or a ball.
;-P
Having had the "soccer is what Americans call it" mantra drummed in from an early age, I was very interested to learn, only very recently, that "soccer" for Association Football has the same English upper-class slang roots as "rugger" for Rugby Football, and it's not actually an Americanism at all, as checking some old dictionaries from the 19th and early 20th centuries as well as Notes and Queries has since confirmed.
Partridge actually has a name for it, the "Oxford -er"; hence "topper" for "top hat", "header" for "heading a ball", "diner" for "dining car", "camper" for "camping car", and so forth.
So one should dislike it for the right reasons: not because it's an Americanism, which it isn't in the first place, but because it's an invention of 19th century Oxbridge toffs who stuck "-er" after the first syllable of everything as a social-class shibboleth. (-:
Edit: Oh wait, sorry, I must have misread/not read that you agreed adding 'across' was weird initially. Thought you were just saying 'sqm/sqft no big deal move on' sort of thing.
For the US it's 201 m2, whereas in Ireland it's 89 m2.
OK, but how many elephants would that be?
;D
Could be why.
Also quite the opposite of 'recently discovered'; it has been one of the best known diving spots in the world for over 50 years, and one of the very few ocean floor features that I can recognize by eye...
> Guided by tips from fishermen, scientists from Colegio de le Frontera Sur explored a tropical estuary off the southeastern coast
> the scientists names their new discovery the Taam ja' Blue Hole, using the Mayan language phrase
Clearly the locals have known about this already. If your argument is that the difference is when it's published in some scientific paper then that's also contradictory to:
> the new blue hole was discovered in 2021, the researchers only recently detailed their findings in a study published in Frontiers in Marine Science
"Discovered in 2021" pretty obviously means Western people here. If it was about "scientific description" then we would've said 2023.
It reminds me of that one white person that traveled to Mexico and "discovered" a variety of corn that produces a mucus-like goo that traps nitrogen from the air itself instead of using bacteria. This variety had an indigenous name and the people who've been growing it for thousands of years could trace back their entire lineage of people who've developed the variety specifically to grow in those low-nitrogen conditions
Though I wouldn't dismiss any relevance of the year 2021, as that was when the scientists did their field work. Imagine another team did study the same hole in 2022 but published earlier, then that would be relevant.
Clearly they knew there was a small patch of deep water. Maybe not much more than that. I think you're being way too quick to jump to self righteousness
The Mayans knew that it was a blue hole. They didn't know that it was among the deepest known in the world, simply that it was one of many blue holes.
If the meaning is clear what seems to be the problem? It seems like manufactured outrage to be upset by this. I just discovered fuente avocados last week. I'm not claiming to be the first human to ever behold them.
As a thought experiment, can a secret never be discovered?
On the facts of the story, it seems highly unlikely that the locals knew that it was the second deepest blue hole on the planet.
"Scientists have released a study of their 2021 discovery of the world's second-deepest blue hole off the Mexican Yucatan Peninsula coast."
I wasn't the best at grammar, but I'm pretty sure the word "their" refers to the scientists, who found it in 2021.
Who did you think the article could have been talking about discovering it if you were so confused?
My guess is you knew exactly what it meant but were triggered and looking for something to be offended about.
To press the issue, how do you feel about Columbus discovering North America? Keep in mind no one has ever claimed that Columbus was the first human to lay foot in North America.
Is this a joke? Am I missing some kind of joke?
If not can you please link me the 2021 academic paper in which this was described.
Hint: it doesn't f*cking exist
These were once deep air-filled vertical shafts, formed by the longterm erosional/dissolutional power of falling water under the influence of gravity. Speleothems like stalactites prove that they formed in an air-filled environment.
In other words, the present-day sea level at the Yucatan Peninsula was formerly at least 275m lower; and/or the present-day surface was at least 275m higher. The paper attributes this to "glacio-eustatic changes", which is the equal-and-opposite-reaction involving lowered sea level (increased global glaciation) and the buoyant rising of the regional continental crust since the mass of additional sea water has been removed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blautopf
Rayleigh scattering on nanoscale limestone particles!
I'm curious why lack of oxygen is a problem? We don't breathe water, so why should oxygen content matter?
Easier to see on Google Earth on a less windy day. Search "Taam Ja’ Blue Hole"