Undersea River Discovered - Black Sea Waterfall

[vivfox]

By: Bill Waters
Staff Writer
Published: Aug 3, 2010

Black Sea researchers discovered an undersea river in England with waterfalls and rapids.
Undersea river discovered near Black Sea in England. Researchers have discovered a river flowing along the bottom of the Black Sea. The undersea river contains channels and researchers discovered it near the Black Sea in England.

According to researchers, the undersea river has everything a normal river does, this includes waterfalls and rapids. "If the undersea river they discovered was on land, it would be the sixth largest river in the world," the researcher stated. The very salty river flows through a deep channel on the floor of the Black Sea, it creates flood plains and has riverbanks just like a land river.

The existence of this undersea river is due to the much saltier Mediterranean Sea flowing into the Black Sea through the Bosphorus Strait. The differing saline levels cause the saltier water to run down to the Black Sea's floor. So far, this is the only active undersea river discovered. The unnamed river has banks 115 feet deep and six-tenths of a mile wide.

"The water in the channels is denser than the surrounding seawater because it has higher salinity and is carrying so much sediment," Dr. Dan Parsons, who discovered the undersea river with his colleagues, said in a statement. "It flows down the sea shelf and out into the abyssal plain much like a river on land,"

"The abyssal plains of our oceans are like the deserts of the marine world, but these channels can deliver nutrients and ingredients needed for life out over these deserts. This means they could be vitally important, like arteries providing life to the deep ocean."

http://www.newsoxy.com/science/under...sea-14070.html