The inner Black Sea basin, which belongs to the Atlantic Ocean basin, washes the shores of various countries, including Russia, and is not only the largest Eurasian resort center, but also an important transport artery and the military-strategic base of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. It washes the shores of Turkey and Georgia, as well as Abkhazia, which many countries consider part of Georgian land, although it is a separate territorial-state entity.
Among the characteristics, the depth of the Black Sea is very important. Thanks to
the Bosphorus, it has a connection with the
Sea of Marmara, and through the Kerch Strait - with the Sea of Azov. On the north side, it washes the shores of the Crimean peninsula, and the border between
Asia Minor and Europe extends along its surface. Data on the total area is mixed. In some sources it is equal to 422 thousand square kilometers, in others - 436.4 thousand square kilometers. On the largest axis, it stretched for almost a thousand two hundred kilometers, and from south to north its maximum length is five hundred and eighty kilometers.
Almost no one gives an exact answer to the question of what is the maximum depth of the Black Sea. Scientists have been doing research for many years. The greatest is the depth of the Black Sea at two thousand two hundred and ten meters. The average value is determined at approximately one thousand two hundred and forty meters. At a depth exceeding one hundred fifty to two hundred meters, in addition to the colonies of some anaerobic microorganisms, there are no living creatures and plants. All these huge deep layers of water are oversaturated with hydrogen sulfide, which prevents the development of living things, even mollusks, because they need oxygen to develop. And the depth of the Black Sea does not contain oxygen in the water column. Therefore, wrecks have been stored in it without damage for thousands of years.
Trade routes of ships from different states passed through Crimea for three millennia. Historians and archaeologists argue that most of the sea voyages across the sea ended in shipwrecks caused by strong winds. Judging by the findings of archaeologists, the relief of the bottom of the Black Sea between the
Crimean peninsula, Romania, Turkey and Bulgaria is replete with sunken ships buried in the abyss of water.
Divers conducting their professional activities in Crimea are well aware of this. Many places of very ancient shipwrecks are already plundered, and photos of finds are actively published on the Web. If the state were not inactive, but organized scientific expeditions, just as it was done in Turkey, then our museums would be replenished with very valuable exhibits. Turkey, on the other hand, invested money in such a project and extracted many valuable exhibits from the bottom of the sea, which served as the basis for the opening of a center for underwater archeology, to which tourists from all over the world come today.
I really want to hope that the depths of the Black Sea will soon reveal their rich potential to state underwater archaeologists, and the findings from the ships of Byzantium will delight visitors to our museums, as their wildlife pleases today.