I was watching a documentary about a team that was planning to go down to the lowest point on the ocean floor somewhere in the arctic.
While the gentleman in the sub was going down, the narrator stated “at this depth, the water outside the submarine is below freezing”.
Soo… why is it not frozen? Does it have to do with the salt content in the water?
ELI5, thanks!
In: Earth Science
In the ocean depths, the deeper the water is the saltier it is. The more salt there is in the water, the lower the temperature it takes to freeze and when it freezes that salt moves to other parts of the water. Another thing that water needs to freeze is to be fairly still. The water at the sea floor is constantly in motion, so it doesn’t freeze.
Between the salt levels and the motion, the water in the arctic tends not to freeze below a certain depth.
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