Thursday, March 18, 2010

Sea Mountains on Google Maps

SeaMounts Online

Seamounts are undersea peaks in the ocean floor, mountains rising from the bottom of the sea that do not break the water's surface. Since 2001, Seamounts Online has been gathering data on species that have been observed or collected from seamounts to help facilitate research into seamount ecology.

Seamounts Online uses Google Maps to provide an interface for the data gathered by the Global Census of Marine Life on Seamounts. The map shows the world's seamounts locations with red map markers. If you click on a seamount map marker an information window opens with links to details, samples, species records and the taxon list for the selected seamount.

I only wish this Google Map had the option to view the data via the Google Earth browser plug-in. It would be really interesting to be able to dive beneath the ocean to view the seamounts, which Google Earth's ocean imagery allows you to do. The site however does provide a KML link, so you can go diving for seamounts directly in Google Earth if you want.

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