The world's second-deepest blue hole has been discovered near where the dinosaur-killing asteroids landed.
It has been found in the bay of the Chetumal Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico, with a depth of 274 meters (899 feet) and an area of 147,000 square feet.
According to scientists from El Colegio de la Frontera Sur (Ecosur), a public research centre first discovered it in September 2021 but released the data in February.
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The blue hole is near the Chicxulub Crater, the impact crater formed by an asteroid thought to have caused the Cretaceous-tertiary extinction of dinosaurs 66 million years ago.
Unlike impact craters, however, blue holes were formed during the last Ice Age when sea levels were over 100 meters (330 feet) lower than the present day.
They would have started life as a limestone cave but as the seawater rose, it flooded and the ceiling collapsed to form a marine cavern.
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The large, undersea vertical caves or sinkholes found in coastal regions, that contain a high diversity of plant and marine life, including corals, sea turtles and sharks.
With the help of scuba divers, water samples, and eco-sound surveys, scientists have found the Chetumal blue hole has a surface area of 13,690 square meters (147,357 square feet) with 80-degree steep sloped sides.
It has been confirmed that its mouth is just under 5 meters (16 feet) below sea level, where the water changes significantly with temperature and salinity gradients.
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The hole is named Taam Ja’ which means 'deep water' in the Mayan language according to the study published on 23 February in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science.
However, this newly identified blue hole is not quite as deep as one off the coast of Belize.
As per Live Science, the south-eastern coast of the Mexican Yucatán Peninsula is full of fascinating geology, like the world’s biggest underwater cave called Sistema Sac Actun.
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The researchers who discovered the new area are keen to study and analyse the microbial diversity of the waters.
Rashi Agarwal