Mid-Atlantic Ridge
Depth: 2,500 m · Midnight Zone
The Mid-Atlantic Ridge is the longest mountain range on Earth. It stretches across the Atlantic Ocean, but is almost entirely hidden underwater. Here two tectonic plates are slowly pulling apart.
For scientists
At the ridge hot mantle rises and freezes into new crust, so the Atlantic widens about 2 to 4 cm per year. The cooling lava locks in the direction of Earth magnetic field; because the field flips again and again, mirror-image magnetic stripes lie on either side of the axis. This very pattern proved plate tectonics in the 1960s.
Source: NOAA
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