Another report (ibid, p.219) filed in
Scientific American, 221:54, July 1969, raises the
possibility that there may be oil-bearing
formations in the abyssal depths of the ocean.
"Seismic-reflection records made by the
research ship Kane last July [from July 1969]
disclosed the existence of geologic structures
resembling salt domes in sedimentary layers of
the ocean bottom at a depth of 15,000 feet
northwest of the Cape Verde Islands. Salt
domes are widely associated with oil deposits
on land, in shallow seas and on continental
shelves. The Cape Verde structures also
resemble an oil-bearing salt dome discovered
at oceanic depth in the Gulf of Mexico last
summer by the deep-drilling ship Glomar
Challenger." Such discoveries were sobering
surprises for geologists.
Corliss includes another eye-opener
(p.368), from Geological Society of America
Bulletin, 65:1261, 1954, concerning seamounts
in the North Atlantic. "The Atlantis, Cruiser
and Great Meteor seamounts rise from a broad
ridge or plateau which extends from the Mid-
Atlantic Ridge at 37° N. 32° W. southeast to
Great Meteor Seamount at 30° N. 28° W….
About a ton of flat pteropod limestone cobbles
was dredged from the summit area [of the
Atlantis Seamount]. One of the cobbles gave an
apparent radiocarbon age of 12,000 years ± 900
(J. L. Kulp). The state of lithification of the
limestone suggests that it may have been
lithified under subaerial conditions and that
the seamount may have been an island within
the past 12,000 years.
R. Cedric Leonard, on his Atlantis Quest
website, offers several thought-provoking
items of geological evidence concerning land in
the middle of the Atlantic that subsided several
thousand years ago. Nearly all of these reports
come from respected journals. A small, but
vital portion has been included here:
In 1948 Dr. Ewing, one of the bitter opponents
of Atlantis, sailed up and down the Mid-Atlantic
Ridge during the Woods Hole Oceanographic
Expeditions to the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Numerous
samples of tremolite asbestos were brought up.
Ewing made this significant comment: "Such rock
is generally considered typical of continents and
not of ocean basins" (Ewing, 1948).
Important also was the discovery of "beachlike
terraces" beneath two miles of ocean water. Ewing
cautiously observed: "It is, of course, extremely
radical speculation to identify these level stretches
more than two miles below the sea surface as
former beaches. Such a theory would require the
obvious but almost incredible conclusion that the
land has subsided two miles or else the sea has
risen by that amount" (Ewing, 1948). However,
subsequent expeditions only strengthened the
"incredible."
According to Ewing, long flat stretches were
detected 2 to 20 miles wide and hundreds of miles
long. These beach-like areas were always covered
with thick sediments, indicating a long period of
deposition, although occasionally separated by
mountainous "higher ground" exhibiting no such
sediments. (The Central Highland of the Ridge
occasionally approaches four-fifths of a mile from
the sea surface.) Ewing observed that deep ocean
basins never have thick sediments—which are the
result of surf action and river deposition—it is
actually shorelines that display thick sediments.
More evidence of just how recently such a
landmass existed turned up during an expedition
the following year.
The follow-up expedition in 1949 turned up
numerous core samples from these terraces. These
cores contained two different strata of beach sand:
the older estimated to be 225,000–325,000 years of
age, and the younger 20,000–100,000 years old
(Ewing, 1949). Another significant fact is that the
deposits were found to be well-sorted by surf
action into the usual pattern of shoreline beaches
familiar to geologists (Miller & Scholten, 1966). His
conclusion was that: "Sometime in the distant past
this sand found deep beneath the ocean must have
been located on a beach, at or near the surface of
the sea" (Ewing, 1949).
During this second Woods Hole Mid-Atlantic
Ridge Expedition Dr. Ewing once again dredged
up continental type rocks. Sample after sample
containing large masses of sial were brought up all
along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. It became obvious
that granite and sedimentary rocks "which
originally must have been part of a continent" were
abundant (Ewing, 1949). Dr. Bruce Heezen,
oceanographer with the Lamont-Doherty
Geological Observatory, observed that this type of
rock indicates "possible sunken land masses"
(Heezen, Tharp & Ewing, 1959).
Geologists have short memories when it comes
to Atlantis. A geologist reviewed the Woods Hole
expeditions of 1948-1949 barely ten years later and
wrote a report on the findings (Cifelli, 1970). I read
his report, word for word and cover to cover: not a
word was written concerning the numerous findings of
continental material (sial) along the Mid-Atlantic
Ridge. Dr. Ewing was puzzled, even dismayed, by
these particular discoveries; yet he was honest
enough to report them. Why were these astounding
facts not included in Richard Cifelli's review? Can
professional geologists be this one-sided?
Still another oceanographic expedition,
Swedish Deep-Sea Expedition of 1947-1948, yielded
core samples containing sand from the Romanche
Deep along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Dr. Otto Mellis
did not publish these findings until ten years later
(Mellis, 1958). Other geologists have guardedly
admitted that the Azore Islands (Central Atlantic)
are composed chiefly of continental material, some
even conceding that there might be enough
continental material (sial) in the mid-Atlantic to
make up a landmass the size of Spain (de Camp,
1970). This is not much smaller than the size I have
been proposing for the island of Atlantis.
References:
Cifelli, Richard, "Age relationships of Mid-Atlantic
Ridge sediments," Special Paper No. 124, Geological
Society of America, 1970.
de Camp, L. Sprague, "Lost Continents," Dover
Publications Inc., New York, 1970.
Ewing, Maurice, "Exploring the Mid-Atlantic Ridge,"
The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. xciv, No. 3,
September 1948.
Ewing, Maurice, "New Discoveries on the Mid-Atlantic
Ridge," The National Geographic Magazine, Vol. xcvi,
No. 5, November 1949.
Heezen, B.C., Tharp, M., Ewing, M., The North Atlantic,
Washington D.C., 1959.
Miller, J. P. & Scholten, R., "Ocean, Lakes, and Shoreline
Features," Laboratory Studies in Geology, No. 225,
1966.
