The
Silent Landscape
Chapter
3. The Restless Earth
Gibraltar,
Mediterranean Sea, 23 January 1873, 36o09'N,
05o 21'W to Station 19, Western Atlantic, 3
March 1873, 19o30'N, 57o 35'W
HMS
Challenger left Gibraltar on January 23, 1873, and finally
headed out into the true unknown, the deep Atlantic Ocean...
Attached
to the sounding wire were various instruments by which
the silent landscape—and its watery atmosphere—could be
probed. There were three main types of instrument: thermometers
for measuring the water temperature at the seafloor (as
well as at various depths in the ocean), specially constructed
flasks for taking samples of deep and bottom waters, and
a device for retrieving sediment samples from the seafloor
itself. All of these instruments were marvels of Victorian
ingenuity and the thermometers and water samplers were
just as extraordinary as the sampling devices described
in Chapter 1. The thermometers were of the maximum and
minimum kind originally invented by James Six in the eighteenth
century and are still known by that name today. They were
used to measure the highest and lowest temperatures encountered
in the long drop to the sea bottom...
Now
click here to enter Chapter 4. Kingdoms of Mud
and Lime...
BACK
A PAGE
|
