“It’s the road to Atlantis,” exclaimed one.
“This is the yellow brick road,” commented another.
As the scientists aboard Exploration Vessel Nautilus continued to marvel, the camera panned along the Nootka Seamount in the depths of the Pacific Ocean, revealing a short stretch of what appeared to be “a road paved in cobblestones.”
This supposed underwater pathway was an oddity in a vastly unexplored expanse of the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, at 582,578 square miles “the largest contiguous fully protected conservation area under the U.S. flag.”
The Lu?uaeaahikiikekumu expedition, which lasted from April 7 to May 1, 2022, was a continuation of last year’s survey of the same group of seamounts, called the Lili?uokalani Ridge and situated north of the Hawaiian Islands. Seamounts, as their name suggests, are underwater mountains at least 3,300 feet in height from the ocean floor. Sources state that tens of thousands of seamounts exist around the world, though “less than 1% have been explored.”
The purpose of the Lu?uaeaahikiikekumu expedition was to learn more about the origins of these seamounts and, thus, “the formation of the northwestern Hawaiian Islands.”
The Universal Flood
Ultimately, the Nautilus team labeled its strange find as “hyaloclastite rock (a volcanic rock formed in high-energy eruptions where many rock fragments settle to the seabed).”
So, in conclusion, it looks as though this so-called submarine artery is far from the fabled gateway to any lost city. Perhaps, however, scientists would do well to revisit the notion. Would it be so far-fetched if remnants of a great metropolis were one day found at the bottom of the ocean?
The Bible tells of a period of history about 5,000 years ago when all the cities of the world were drowned in a worldwide Flood, resulting in only eight survivors: Noah and his family: “In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. And the rain was on the earth forty days and forty nights” (Genesis 7:11, 12). The Scriptures continue, “And the waters prevailed exceedingly on the earth, and all the high hills under the whole heaven were covered. The waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward, and the mountains were covered. … And the waters prevailed on the earth one hundred and fifty days” (vv. 19, 20, 24).
What could be learned about the world in which we live if scientists would simply ask its Creator?
There are those, in fact, who look to the Hawaiian Islands as silent monuments to the universal Flood. We commonly think of Hawaii in terms of its top vacation spots, the Big Island, Maui, O’ahu, but it actually consists of many more islands and islets. Its exposed land masses are merely the end of a chain of mountains that reaches far northward, all the way to Alaska. The difference is that the majority of those mountains are underwater—yes, they’re seamounts. This submarine range, called the Hawaiian-Emperor seamount chain, was formed by volcanic activity.
Notably, this range shows a “pattern. … The largest and active volcanoes are at one end,” which are the well-known Hawaiian Islands. But then, “as you move northward along the chain, the past lava output and volumes become progressively less and the volcanoes smaller, until the volcanoes don’t even rise above the surface and are long dead.” Additionally, the volcanoes are consecutive not only in size but also in age. The smaller the mountain, the older it is. Lastly, geologists have dubbed Hawaii “a hotspot volcano,” which is a “spot” that is “hot” in the earth, “an area of the Earth’s mantle from which hot plumes rise upward, forming volcanoes on the overlying crust.”
Now, pair that hotspot with the catastrophic movement of the Earth’s plates during the Flood. As “the fountains of the great deep were broken up” and geysers burst forth, splitting the earth, the Pacific Plate would have suddenly and drastically shifted, moving the land over the hotspot and creating a rapid series of small volcanoes. Then, “as the Flood was waning, the plate motions [would have] decelerated,” allowing the hotspot more time over the same tracts of land, forming the larger volcanoes that would eventually become the Hawaiian Islands.
The Final Judgment
“As the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be” (Matthew 24:37), the Bible warns us. “For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be” (vv. 38, 39).
Many scientists believe that the Flood is as much of a myth as Atlantis. But look around you. It is in the sea, the mountains, the very earth on which you walk. The evidence of God’s existence and Creatorship are in plain sight. Though “scoffers will come in the last days, … saying, ‘Where is the promise of His coming?’” (2 Peter 3:3, 4), the Bible declares that Jesus Christ will return. As surely as the Flood did occur and “the world that then existed perished, being flooded with water” (v. 6), so will Christ return to judge humanity. Learn about these comparisons in our powerful presentation on “The Flood.”
May we each, like Noah, be “a preacher of righteousness” (2:5), heralding the Lord’s soon coming and pointing a hardened world to the only Savior.