| No Images? Click here   Chris D'Angelo, who covers the environment and climate change for HuffPost, traveled to the depths of the ocean to report on how frozen gas deposits might respond in our rapidly warming world. He boarded a research vessel with scientists to explore what one oceanographer calls the "methane dragon." It's a fascinating story about rising ocean temperatures and the debate among scientists about the possible threat of a looming "methane time bomb." Here's a bit more from D'Angelo about what he hopes readers can learn from the piece.I love that you got to actually go a mile underwater for this piece. What was that experience like? I really struggle to find the right words. It was thrilling, shockingly beautiful and completely bizarre. When we finally glimpsed the seafloor after a 70-minute descent, I remember thinking to myself, “This is just impossible.” And yet there you are, shoulder to shoulder with two other people in a frigid titanium sphere cruising the ocean floor, looking at alien creatures that few humans have ever set eyes on. The thing that has really stuck with me was the descent: As the light fades to complete darkness, you begin to see all the bioluminescent organisms buzzing around in the water column. You were clearly immersed in the experience of it all. How did the reporting and story all come together? I was invited to join the two-week expedition early last year. Having never been to sea, I jumped at the opportunity. My initial interest wasn’t so much methane seeps, but the deep sea coral ecosystems the team planned to explore. (I’ve been writing about corals for years, but had never given much thought to corals in the deep ocean). But as I began talking with Samantha Joye and other scientists onboard, I became fascinated with these cold seeps and the methane-eating bacteria that inhabit them. I spent a lot of time with Joye as she worked late at night in the ship’s labs, and her curiosity about these complex systems wore off on me. I think it was when I saw Joye’s reaction to the high concentrations of methane in the water at Pea Island seep that I knew this was an important story to tell. What do you hope readers take away from the story? That we humans have so, so much to learn about the world’s oceans and how we are impacting even the most remote corners of the planet. And that the deep sea isn’t some lifeless abyss, but a series of diverse ecosystems that are essential not only to the overall health of the ocean but humanity as a whole. Was there anything from your reporting that didn't make it into the story that you think is interesting and want to continue to explore? More than 80% of the ocean is unmapped and unexplored. In fact, we have more detailed maps of Mars than of Earth’s oceans. While I was at sea, the DEEP SEARCH team discovered an 85-mile-long coral reef a half mile below the surface. There is still much more to find out there.  🔥 More Must Reads 🔥
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