Oceans trivia | 40 facts about the Pacific (part 2)

Oceans are body waters that all together cover 72% of the planet. This is really exciting, and interesting. But how many things do we know about them?

Let’s find out more about the Pacific ocean.

1. The Pacific Ocean is the largest of Earth’s oceanic divisions.
2. It is also the deepest one in the world.
3. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south and is bounded by the continents of Asia and Australia in the west and the Americas in the east.
4. The Pacific oceans covers about 46% of Earth’s water surface.
5. When it comes in total surface area it covers about 32%.
6. The centers of both the Water Hemisphere and the Western Hemisphere are in the Pacific Ocean.
7. The equator subdivides it into the North(ern) Pacific Ocean and South(ern) Pacific Ocean,
8. There are two exceptions: the Galápagos and Gilbert Islands, that while straddling the equator, are deemed wholly within the South Pacific.
9. Its mean depth is 4,000 meters (13,000 feet).
10. Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, located in the western north Pacific, is the deepest point in the world, reaching a depth of 10,928 meters (35,853 feet).
11. The Pacific also contains the deepest point in the Southern Hemisphere, the Horizon Deep in the Tonga Trench, at 10,823 meters (35,509 feet).
12. The third deepest point on Earth, the Sirena Deep, is also located in the Mariana Trench.
13. The western Pacific has many major marginal seas, including the South China Sea, the East China Sea, the Sea of Japan, the Sea of Okhotsk, the Philippine Sea, the Coral Sea, and the Tasman Sea.
14. Its temperature varies between 29.5F (-1.4C) in poleward areas and 86F (30C) near to the equator
15. Asia and Oceania natives have traveled the Pacific Ocean since prehistoric times.
16. The eastern Pacific though was first sighted by Europeans in the early 16th century.
17. It was dicovered by the Spanish explorer Vasco de Balboa.
18. More specifically when the Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama in 1513, discovered the great “southern sea” which he named Mar del Sur (in Spanish).
19. The ocean’s current name was coined by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan during the Spanish circumnavigation of the world in 1521 as he encountered favorable winds on reaching the ocean.
20. He called it Mar Pacífico, which in both Portuguese and Spanish means “peaceful sea”.^[6]
21. The ocean has most of the islands in the world.
22. There are about 25,000 islands in the Pacific Ocean
23. New Guinea, the world’s second largest island, is located in the Pacific ocean.
24. The islands entirely within the Pacific Ocean can be divided into three main groups known as Micronesia, Melanesia and Polynesia.
25. Micronesia, which lies north of the equator and west of the International Date Line, includes the Mariana Islands in the northwest, the Caroline Islands in the center, the Marshall Islands to the east and the islands of Kiribati in the southeast.
26. Melanesia, to the southwest, includes New Guinea, which is by far by far the largest of the Pacific islands.
27. The other main Melanesian groups from north to south are the Bismarck Archipelago, the Solomon Islands, Santa Cruz, Vanuatu, Fiji and New Caledonia.
28. The largest area is Polynesia.
29. Polynesia is stretching from Hawaii in the north to New Zealand in the south.
30. It also encompasses Tuvalu, Tokelau, Samoa, Tonga and the Kermadec Islands to the west, the Cook Islands, Society Islands and Austral Islands in the center, and the Marquesas Islands, Tuamotu, Mangareva Islands, and Easter Island to the east.
31. Most of the world’s active volcanoes are located underwater in the Pacific ocean.
32. More specifically they are located in an area in the Pacific Ocean called the “Ring of Fire”.
33. More than 450 volcanoes stretch for 40,250 kilometers (25,000 miles) in a u-shape from the southern tip of South America, along the west coast of North America, across the Bering Strait, down through Japan, and into New Zealand.
34. This represents more than 75% of the world’s active and dormant volcanoes.
35. The Ring of Fire is also an area of frequent earthquakes.
36. 90% of the world’s earthquakes occurring in this area.
37. The Pacific Ocean is home to Point Nemo,a  pole of inaccessibility that marks the furthest location from the ocean to the nearest coastline.
38. It derives from the Latin meaning  “no one”, and Point Nemo got its name from Jules Verne’s Captain Nemo who roams the oceans in his submarine.
39. The Pacific Ocean is also home to the White Shark Café.
40. This is a distance location off the coast of Baja California that scientists are still trying to figure out why these sharks hang out there.