Mid-Atlantic Ridge

Deep down under the big, blue water, it is very quiet. The sunshine cannot reach me here. Swish, swish go the little fish as they swim all around my tall peaks. I am a long, bumpy mountain, but nobody on land could see me for a very long time. I stretch and stretch like a giant zipper on the bottom of the big Atlantic Ocean. I am a secret mountain range. I am the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

I have been growing for a very, very long time. The floor of the Earth is like a big puzzle made of giant pieces. A long time ago, around 180 million years ago, these puzzle pieces started to move apart very slowly. As they moved, hot, bubbly rock from deep inside the Earth came up through the crack. The hot rock felt warm. When it touched the cold ocean water, it cooled down and got hard, like stacking a new block on a tower. Block by block, I grow a little bit taller and a little bit wider. I am still growing today, but so slowly you would never feel it.

For a long, long time, I was a happy secret at the bottom of the sea. Then, people in boats started to wonder what was below them. In the 1870s, a special boat sailed right over my head. It measured how deep the water was and found my bumpy tops. It was a surprise. Much later, in the 1950s, a very clever person named Marie Tharp took all the measurements and drew a beautiful picture of me. It was the very first map of my whole shape. Now, everyone knows I am here. I am here to remind you that our world is always changing and that there are wonderful secrets waiting to be discovered.