British scientists have embarked on a mission to study a gigantic hole in the Atlantic seabed – an enigma that defies traditional geophysical theory and will give researchers an unprecedented look into the center of the Earth. The 12-person team left the Canary Islands on Monday with a new high-tech vessel and a robotic device named TOBI (Towed Ocean Bottom Instrument) that will dig up rock samples at the bottom of the crater and film what it sees. The hole is about 16.400 feet under the surface of the Atlantic and located half way between Tenerife and Barbados. It has a diameter of 10.000 to 13.000 feet. The mysterious orifice is in an undersea mountain range, the kind of structure believed to form when Atlantic tectonic plates separate and volcanic lava surges upward to fill the gap in the earth’s crust. But that did not happen this time. Instead, the hole exposes the mantle.

Scientists uncover the mystery of the Atlantic’s missing crust