Fact Finders ENDANGERED OCEANS INVESTIGATING OCEANS IN CRISIS by Jody Sullivan Rake Content Consultant Craig A Layman PhD Department of Applied Ecology North Carolina State University CAPSTONE PRESS a capstone imprint
CHAPTER 1 The Blue Planet The oceans are filled with a diverse array of life Rocky shores tropical coral reefs frigid polar seas even the black sunless deep The ocean is a collection of many habitats all bursting with life Oceans may seem too big and vast to be harmed by anything humans could do But the effects of human activities are everywhere habitat the natural place and conditions in which a plant or animal lives
FACT The average depth of the ocean is about 12 400 feet 3 800 meters Its deepest point is the Marianas Trench in the western Pacific Ocean The trench is more than 7 miles 11 kilometers deep All of Mount Everest the world's tallest mountain would fit into the Marianas Trench The mountain's top would still be more than a mile from the water's surface Trash washes up on shores all over the world Giant schools of tuna have been reduced to small isolated groups Huge heaps of trash cover large areas of ocean Dazzling coral reefs are becoming gray lumps of rubble The oceans and all of the life within them are in danger The oceans formed billions of years ago But it has taken less than 150 years to change them forever
