Where is the trench on the ocean floor?

The Mariana Trench or Marianas Trench is located in the western Pacific Ocean about 200 kilometres (124 mi) east of the Mariana Islands; it is the deepest oceanic trench on Earth. It is crescent-shaped and measures about 2,550 km (1,580 mi) in length and 69 km (43 mi) in width.

Which is the deepest trench on the ocean floor?

Mariana Trench
The deepest part of the ocean is called the Challenger Deep and is located beneath the western Pacific Ocean in the southern end of the Mariana Trench, which runs several hundred kilometers southwest of the U.S. territorial island of Guam. Challenger Deep is approximately 36,200 feet deep.

Are ocean trenches the true ocean floor?

Oceanic trenches are topographic depressions of the seafloor, relatively narrow in width, but very long. These oceanographic features are the deepest parts of the ocean floor.

What is an example of an oceanic trench?

Finding Trenches Ocean trenches exist in all the world’s oceans. They include the Philippine Trench, Tonga Trench, the South Sandwich Trench, the Eurasian Basin and Malloy Deep, the Diamantina Trench, the Puerto Rican Trench, and the Mariana.

Why are most oceanic trenches found in the Pacific Ocean?

Why are most oceanic trenches found in the Pacific Ocean? The Pacific Ocean is shrinking and plates are descending below surrounding plates along its edges, hence the creation of trenches.

Why are most oceanic trenches in the Pacific?

What causes a deep ocean trench?

Ocean trenches are a result of tectonic activity, which describes the movement of the Earth’s lithosphere. At many convergent plate boundaries, dense lithosphere melts or slides beneath less-dense lithosphere in a process called subduction, creating a trench.

How is a trench formed on the ocean floor?

Trenches are formed by subduction, a geophysical process in which two or more of Earth’s tectonic plates converge and the older, denser plate is pushed beneath the lighter plate and deep into the mantle, causing the seafloor and outermost crust (the lithosphere) to bend and form a steep, V-shaped depression.

What causes an ocean trench?

Ocean trenches are typically caused when an oceanic crustal plate slides under a lighter continental plate or another oceanic plate. It is believed to work by density.

Why are deep trenches found on the ocean floor?

Older sections of the sea floor have deeper trenches, which happens because heavier rock tends to sink over time . The fact that these deep-ocean trenches existed at all remained a secret until well into the 20th century. That’s because there were no vessels that could explore those regions.

What is the most famous ocean trench?

The Aleutian Trench, in the North Pacific Ocean , and the deepest, most famous one in the world, the Marianas Trench off the coast of the Marianas Islands in the Southeast Pacific. These are all places where oceanic plates are subducting beneath continental plates.