click here to join the blue idea network's social media network

Over a cubic kilometer of sand and mud descended to the bottom, in a gigantic flow that lasted two whole days and a length of over 1,100 km at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.

This incident would not have been recorded if it had not caused the breakage of two submarine telecommunication cables, slowing down the Internet and other data traffic between Nigeria and South Africa. Scientists also had instruments in the area capable of measuring current velocities and sediments.

As Peter Tolling, a professor at Durham University, told BBC News, the landslide was gradually becoming faster, entraining sand and mud.

The incident began on January 14 last year, and was reported now because scientists needed time to recover the sensors and fully analyze the data.

According to the researchers, two factors were combined for the incident: the first was a particularly large flood on the Congo River in late December 2019 and the second some unusually large tidal couples.

click here to join the blue idea network's social media network