Kind: captions
Language: en
what do Hawaii and Panama have in common
one's an isolated string of dots in the
middle of the Pacific the other is a
slender connector of two continents the
two places are 5,000 Mi apart and yet
curiously they have a very similar
origin story a story that explains the
biodiversity and climate across a vast
stretch of the planet but first we need
to get our hands on some rocks in Panama
and not just any rocks when we want to
study
the interior of the earth we have the
problem that we don't get directly to it
we cannot directly sample it yes because
it's too hot it's too deep we cannot
drill into it so we have to rely on
volcanic rocks that come to us to the
surface the first mineral to crystallize
out of that molten volcanic mass is a
green one called Olivine find Olivine
and it's like catching a glimpse of the
interior of the earth and the forces
that help shape the landscape we see
today but finding the right rocks takes
a lot of work class and gazelle have to
visit beach after beach after
Beach it takes the better part of a day
here yes but finally and look at the the
sand is full of
Olivine oh look there's one great wow
look at that and look at the sand the
sand is all full with Olivine oh yeah
it's all green this is excellent
this is the way that rock looks inside
it's full of the green mineral Olivine a
lot of things happened since this rck
was formed many million years ago and
here's what that Olivine can tell us
about those happenings many of the rocks
on this beach and elsewhere in Panama
were actually formed far from here in
the place where the Galapagos Islands
are today by this thermal anomaly we
call the Galapagos PLO this is where we
get to how Panama and Hawaii are alike a
plume is a mass of super heated rock
that rises from the mantle the layer of
Earth between the crust and the core and
heads to the surface over time as the
overlying crust moves a string of
volcanoes form this is how Hawaii was
made and it's how the area that would
become Panama was made as well somewhere
between 5 and 15 million years ago out
by the galopagos a mantle plume created
a series of volcanic islands as the
plate they were riding on moved to the
north East they eventually collided with
a different string of volcanoes already
dotting the water between North and
South America the seamounts and Islands
from the Galapagos plume were
accumulated and eventually closed up the
ismos of Panama and closed up the ocean
current that is what had been a free
flow of water between the Pacific and
Atlantic Oceans was now sealed off and
it's very amazing that something as deep
as a mantle Plum could change change
something as significant as ocean
circulation and result in northern
hemisphere glaciation not to mention a
complete redistribution of biodiversity
across two continents once the Panama we
know today came into existence a land
bridge was formed allowing animals from
North America to walk Slither and Gallop
into South America and vice versa Panama
has had a lasting impact on the life
forms and climate of the earth oh my God
look at this okay let's take it quick
it's so beautiful woo this is incredible
this is a great sample