No Snorkel Required

Is the Age of Exploration dead? Hardly—especially if you want to wander the hidden realms of the deep (from your desk) with the U.S. Geological Survey's new Coastal and Marine Geology Video and Photograph Portal. The USGS has been busy composing and compiling 100,000 photos and 1,000 video hours of mostly never-before-seen seascapes. By towing underwater cameras with boats and taking aerial shots from planes, scientists captured the ocean bottom and its adjacent coastlines in the interactive map below (it's kind of like Google Street View, submarine style).

The sea-floor coverage gives a detailed glimpse into habitat composition, which could help with designating marine protected areas and identifying an ecosystem's needs (and threats), while the bird's-eye-view photos help monitor sea-level rise, hurricane damage, and other changes to the coast. Just zoom in on a section of sea—the portal covers 2,000 miles of the Pacific, Atlantic, and Gulf coasts—and explore away! Go on, landlubber, get your feet wet.

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