The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) states that the ocean covers about 139 million square miles, or roughly 70% of our little Blue Marble’s surface. On average, that water is 12,080 feet deep, or well over two miles. However, that’s nothing compared to the planet’s deepest point, which lies in the Western North Pacific Ocean, east of the Philippines and south of Japan. The Mariana Trench not only stretches over 1,580 miles and averages 43 miles wide, but also reaches a staggering depth of 36,021 feet (almost 7 miles).
What’s more, over 90% of all that water is what’s considered “deep ocean,” with depths of more than 656 feet. Current estimates suggest that only 28.7% of our planet’s entire seafloor has been mapped. Considering all of these facts, the easy, obvious answer is: We probably won’t ever know how many shipwrecks have happened all around the world — at least given our current level of technology.
There’s a historical challenge to the question as well. The oldest human-built boat we know of is about 10,000 years old, but seafaring people were almost certainly exploring the world long before that. Evidence suggests a band of hunter-gatherers traveled from Southeast Asia across hundreds of miles of islands to what is now New South Wales, Australia — by boat, some 50,000 years ago — and became its first Aboriginal people. That’s a long time for shipwrecks to accumulate. Still, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) estimates that over 3 million undiscovered shipwrecks lie on ocean floors, and less than 1% have been explored.
Shipwrecks happen all the time
The Global Maritime Wrecks Database (GMWD) has only 250,000
The Global Maritime Wrecks Database (GMWD) has only 250,000 of those estimated 3 million wreck locations on file, with new shipwrecks constantly being found. Further clouding the waters, older wooden ships tend to break down over time. Recently, a team of archaeologists found what is currently accepted as the oldest shipwreck discovered so far, dating back 4,500 years (2700 – 2400 BCE). The ship itself, which sank off the coast of Turkey, has dissolved into almost nothingness, but its cargo of pottery vessels of oil, wine, and tree resin remained relatively intact.
Let’s break down some other numbers, Barney-style. In the last decade alone, 905 shipwrecks have been recorded. NOAA’s Office of Coast Survey (OCS), which “only” began in 1807, believes as many as 10,000 wrecked ships lie in North America’s waterways. All that pales in comparison, though, to the global conflagration that was World War II, where over 13,000 ships were sunk.
Then, of course, we have Mother Nature, who creates high winds, rough seas, squalls, hurricanes, and typhoons … in addition to what’s known as the “Graveyard of the Pacific.” The Columbia River Bar is where the Columbia River collides with the Pacific Ocean and has claimed over 2,000 ships so far. Bottom line: Certain places on the planet, as well as man-made cataclysmic world events, have and will continue to cause massive losses of both lives and ships, many of which we’ll simply never know about.
