Waves off the coast of Nazaré, Portugal, can reach over 100 feet and are caused by the area's deep underwater canyon geography

What makes the world's biggest waves?

Some of the world’s biggest waves, routinely reaching 100 feet high, are formed near the town of Nazaré, Portugal. But what makes this area so prone to massive swells? While a number of factors are involved, the key feature is the Nazaré Canyon,...

The world's largest waterfall is in the ocean

In the Denmark Strait between Greenland and Iceland, a series of cataracts descend from 2,000 to 10,000 feet beneath the surface. The underwater waterfall is possible because cold water is denser than warm water and quickly sinks in the region.

Portugal's 1775 earthquake is considered Europe's first modern natural disaster

An 8.5-magnitude earthquake off the Portuguese coast nearly destroyed Lisbon, killing thousands, creating 16-foot-wide fissures in the city, and triggering a massive tsunami. Historians credit it with jump-starting the Enlightenment in the region, with many thinkers seeking natural explanations.

The Pacific Northwest's last 'really big one'

More than 300 years ago, a shift in the Cascadia subduction zone caused the seafloor near the Pacific Northwest coast to drop by three to six feet. The force generated a massive tsunami that traveled across the Pacific and devastated Japan.

Explore the animals that populate the depths of the ocean, from fish and coral in the first few hundred feet, all the way down to the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

Into the Mariana Trench

Located in the western Pacific Ocean, the Mariana Trench is the deepest known point on Earth. Its lowest point, known as Challenger Deep, is farther down than the height of Mount Everest by more than a mile. This 13-minute video discusses how the trench was formed, and the extreme conditions at the sea floor.

38 thought-provoking facts about the ocean

Coral produces its own sunscreen, tsunamis move at 500 miles per hour, one of the loudest sounds ever recorded came from an ice quake, and other interesting facts collected from sources such as National Geographic and NASA.

Fly through the Valles Marineris, the largest canyon in the solar system

Stretching farther than the width of the continental US and with depths as much as four times those of the Grand Canyon, the Valles Marineris is believed to have formed when Mars’s crust tore open during intense volcanism in the planet’s past.

For centuries, Niagara Falls has been a magnet for daredevils seeking to conquer one of nature's most powerful wonders, with its 200-foot drop and water rushing at 32 feet per second with 280 tons of force.

An interactive of the deep sea

The CCZ is believed to harbor trillions of dollars of valuable minerals and thousands of undiscovered species

Located between Hawaii and Mexico and spanning an area larger than the European Union, the Clarion-Clipperton Zone is the world's region with the most contracts awarded to groups seeking to extract valuable metals by collecting polymetallic nodules. Conservative estimates suggest that 21.1 billion tons of polymetallic nodules exist in this abyssal plain, but about 90% of the species in the area are unknown to scientists.

Satellite imagery of the massive seaweed blob in the Atlantic

A belt of sargassum seaweed that stretches from the west coast of Africa to the Gulf of Mexico is the largest on record for March.

The booming fossil industry on the Jurassic Coast

Ever since the Jurassic Coast was registered as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2001, professional and amateur fossil-finders have increasingly set out for its craggly cliffs to discover ammonites, icthyosaurs, and even new discoveries. This photo essay takes a human look at the growing interest and industry in fossil discoveries along the famed 95-mile strip of England.

Watch a North Carolina house collapse into the ocean

While the Outer Banks experiences beach erosion, rip currents and overwash from a nor’easter along the coast, a seaside house in Rodanthe collapsed Tuesday.

Offshore wind turbines are built like giant modular puzzles at sea

Due to their enormous size, turbines are assembled in parts on-site using prefab components, advanced cranes, and vibration-dampening systems to manage the dynamic ocean environment. Three-blade turbines became the norm because even-numbered blades create damaging vibrations.

Dust from the Sahel and Saharan regions makes northwest Africa a hurricane nursery

NASA’s Convective Processes Experiment—Cabo Verde studied the early stages of hurricane formation, identifying how dust interacts with clouds over the ocean to produce the rainy disturbances that become tropical cyclones.

Researchers identify a hidden instability pattern in simple ocean wave models

Stokes waves—a solution to the mathematics of water waves—were once assumed to be stable. Italian mathematicians have proven disturbances cause these waves to collapse and such collapses follow an infinite repeating pattern. To complete the proof, the team offered a $100 donation to solicit online help.

The volcano threatening the Greek island of Santorini

Santorini is a popular tourist destination, known for its stunning white architecture and dreamy blue waters. Yet underneath the charming island is a potentially dangerous underwater volcano. Recent earthquakes have triggered nearly half of residents to evacuate, signaling heightened uncertainty about when the volcano could erupt. Researchers studying activity in the region plan to produce detailed hazard maps for Greek authorities to improve local safety and emergency planning.

Angler catches nine-foot-long catfish

An Italian fishermen struggled for 43 minutes to reel in an over nine-foot catfish in the river Po, marking one of the largest such catches in history.

Massive blooms of microscopic plankton called dinoflagellates produce the neon blue light seen in glowing tides.

Slab pull and ridge push contribute to convection-driven oceanic crust movement

Through ridge push, after magma is projected up from the mantle, it cools and sinks, allowing gravity to help push older oceanic crust away. As this crust sinks into the mantle at deep-sea trenches, it pulls on the trailing crust behind it, accelerating ocean crust movement.

Niagara Falls flows over 400-million-year-old layered rock

The falls cut through distinct layers of ancient rock: a hard cap of Lockport Dolomite sits atop softer layers of Rochester and Queenston Shale. This structure allows the falls to maintain a steep vertical drop as erosion undercuts the caprock.

An investigation suggests a Scottish island became awash in forever chemicals via seafoam and seaspray—raising questions about what that means for the safety of other coastal areas.

The Dokos shipwreck, the oldest discovered to date, is more than 4,000 years old

Many of the oldest shipwrecks yet discovered sank during the late Bronze Age as Mediterranean trade networks began to flourish. This video explores the nine oldest wreckage sites, topped by the wreck off the Greek island of Dokos.

El Niño, Spanish for 'the boy,' was named after Jesus Christ because the phenomenon resembled the weather changes observed around Christmastime.

'Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog' is an iconic romantic artwork

Caspar David Friedrich’s painting portrays man’s fascination with the natural world and emphasizes his smallness in the midst of its grandeur, epitomizing Edmund Burke's concept of "the sublime."

Ingenuity and advanced engineering have allowed trains to overcome extreme landscapes

The Jungfrau Railway utilizes electric trains powered by hydroelectric energy to ascend the Swiss Alps, while Poland's Elbląg Canal hauls ships along cable-powered tracks driven by waterwheels. Germany's Wuppertal monorail navigates bends as it glides over a river valley, and New Mexico's Holloman High-Speed Test Track can achieve speeds of Mach 8.6 for rocket sleds.

Differences in seismic wave speeds let scientists determine an earthquake’s location

Because primary waves are faster than secondary waves, seismic stations will detect longer gaps between these waves’ arrivals the farther an earthquake is. Calculating the distance to the earthquake from three stations allows its origin to be triangulated.

Neanderthals commonly had surfer's ear, a potential sign of extensive seafood collection

Analysis from 2019 found that about half of the 23 Neanderthal skulls scientists examined seemed to have the bony growths in the inner ear, signifying they had surfer's ear. Those growths suggest our ancient relatives, dating back to between perhaps 100,000 and 40,000 years ago, were potentially hunting fish, mollusks, or other marine resources in chilly waters.

El Niño, Spanish for 'the boy,' was named after Jesus Christ because the phenomenon resembled the weather changes observed around Christmastime.

A pickleball's loud 'pop' sound can reach 120 decibels, which is equivalent to a hammer hitting a nail

Coral polyps reproduce via broadcast spawning, where entire reefs simultaneously release reproductive cells for about one hour, once a year.

Larger animals like giraffes, elephants, and blue whales have developed a unique defense against cancer, a phenomenon known as Peto's Paradox

See photos of Meteora, a mountainous site in central Greece, home to 14th-century monasteries perched atop soaring outcroppings.

Hotels in Cannes, the glamorous city on the French Riviera, hire hawks to ward off seagulls during the city's famous film festival.

All rainbows are 'raincircles' caused by water droplets separating white sunlight into a spectrum of colors, but Earth's surface blocks the bottom half of the circle from our line of sight.

See a 3D reconstruction of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital that was home to an estimated population of 200,000 to 400,000.

Explore chaos in this simulation of two double pendulums, where small differences in the release angles produce wildly different outcomes.

Neutron stars, the remains of some massive stars after they explode in a supernova, are the densest directly observable objects in the universe.

NBA superstar Victor Wembanyama spent the 2025 summer training with monks in central China to enhance his body and mind.

Volcanic activity may have triggered the Black Death by spewing gases that led to crop failures in Europe, thus forcing the import of grain ships with plague-infested fleas.

The Nasdaq's 'Magnificent 7' companies are responsible for roughly 40% of the Nasdaq 100 index's gains, while the remaining 93 companies account for the other 60%.

See how Budweiser's famous Clydesdales spend their days at Warm Springs Ranch, where roughly 70 to 80 of the beer brand's giant horses can be found at any given time.

Massive 3D printers have been used to build homes by stacking layers of 'concrete toothpaste,' a fire-resistant material that effectively insulates against outside noise.

A 2019 Facebook event called on attendees to "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us," resulting in countless memes, the creation of a music festival, and eventually the arrests of those who did try to approach the area.

Lesser-known phobias include turophobia, or the fear of cheese, and nomophobia, the fear of being without your cell phone.

Quincy Jones' 'Big Band Bossa Nova' helped introduce bossa nova—a jazz-influenced Brazilian genre—to the US

In preparation for this weekend's Eurovision finale, which is something like the World Cup of pop music, here's a young Céline Dion performing (for Switzerland?) at the 1988 competition.

Explore a list of the 100 best novels of all time, compiled by some of the world's best living writers, including Salman Rushdie, Stephen King, and Jennifer Egan.

44% of Americans say they pray at least once a day—discover how your state's religiosity stacks up against the rest of the country.