© NGS
The Moytirra Vent Field, reported by a team led by Andy Wheeler of University College, in Cork, Ireland, rests on the mid-Atlantic ridge north of the Azores islands. Hydrothermal vents typically form deep-sea chimneys covered with minerals and release boiling waters into undersea ecosystems crawling with strange shrimp, snails and other critters. The team found the vents using a remotely-piloted sub called the the Holland I.
"On the first dive, we found the edge of the vent field within two hours of arriving on the seafloor," said Wheeler, in a statement. "The (sub) descended a seemingly bottomless underwater cliff into the abyss. We never reached the bottom, but rising up from below were these chimneys of metal sulphides belching black plumes of mineral-rich superheated water."
