Amazing Things You Never Knew About Our Oceans

There’s a spot in the Pacific that you’re closer to space than anywhere on Earth

This unique spot, the farthest on the entire planet from land, goes by ‘the oceanic pole of inaccessibility,’ or, more concisely, ‘Point Nemo.’ We know what you’re thinking—its name does not come from a cartoon fish but from the hero of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. It’s located smack in the southern Pacific Ocean, and you’d have to travel 1,000 miles from even the closest points of land to reach it.

Those points of land are Motu Nui, far off the western coast of Chile; Ducie Island, one of the Pitcairn Islands between South America and Australia; and Maher Island, off the coast of Antarctica. And it’s at least a thousand miles from each of them. That’s so far that the closest people to Point Nemo are often up in space! The International Space Station orbits just 250 miles above Earth’s surface.