Q 01/05

The Mariana Trench lies in which ocean?

A) Pacific

B) Indian

C) Atlantic

D) Southern

Answer · why

A) Pacific

Pacific: most of the world's deepest trenches ring this one ocean, because its old, heavy seabed is sinking back into the Earth around the edges.

Q 02/05

The trench's deepest point, the Challenger Deep, takes its name from what?

A) A NASA Space Shuttle

B) A British survey ship

C) A US Navy submarine

D) A Jules Verne novel

Answer · why

B) A British survey ship

A British survey ship, HMS Challenger, first measured the depth there in 1875, and NASA later named a Space Shuttle after the same vessel.

Q 03/05

Which mountain could be dropped into the trench and still have its summit about 2 km underwater?

A) Aconcagua

B) Mount McKinley

C) Mount Kilimanjaro

D) Mount Everest

Answer · why

D) Mount Everest

Mount Everest would vanish with room to spare. A fitting fate: the rock near its summit is limestone laid down on an ancient seabed and later pushed u...

Q 04/05

On a map, the Mariana Trench traces what shape?

A) A straight line

B) A crescent

C) A ring

D) A zigzag

Answer · why

B) A crescent

A crescent: the trench bows around the Mariana Islands, and the islands curve the same way, because a single plate boundary shaped them both.

Q 05/05

The pressure at the bottom of the trench is roughly how many times atmospheric pressure at sea level?

A) About 10

B) About 100

C) About 1,000

D) About 10,000

Answer · why

C) About 1,000

About 1,000 times: pressure climbs by one atmosphere for every 10 metres of seawater, and nearly 11 km of it is stacked above the trench floor.