Day 17 Position 15:49.75N 52:18.32W

Symatchmaker
Tue 9 Dec 2008 12:45
We have made excellent progress through
the last 24hours - we are in very good ENE Trades blowing at a steady 15 to 18
knots and Matchmaker has now broken her own record of a days run; clocking up an
exhilarating 220 miles! Whoop Whoop!!
Our destination is now 508 miles to the
west - 60 hours sailing - the nearest land however is 3 miles below! Oh, -
what lives at the bottom of the Ocean and twitches?* - back to the blog;-
This land is some of the newest on our planet - it is fresh earth crust
generated from the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. This new crust is growing out laterally
from the ridge that Matchmaker has crossed during the last 4 days. This new
crust is growing at a rate of 3 to 5 mm per year - (the rate of a human Toe
Nail growth). We know this because each extrusion of new crust becomes
magnetised with the then current Earth`s polarity when it cools. Periodically
(across thousands of years) the earths polarity "wobbles" and sometime even
flips to alternate poles. This effect creates a magnetic map - a bit like a bar
code, that has an identical match East and West of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.
Measuring the "growth of the Bar code" indicates the rate of expansion of the
Atlantic Ocean.
200 million years ago there was not an
Atlantic Ocean - the continents of Africa and South America were joined
-(Gonwandaland) and the Amazon flowed Westward into the Pacific. The ARC
would have been a very dififferent affair!
The Tuna was delicious - it was pan
fried in a lime & corriander butter and served with rice and peas. The
best fish yet and by far.. * A Nervous Wreck ( ha ha hee hee ! ) |