294 OCEANOGRAPHY IN THE UNITED STATES 



MEMBERS OF AMSOC COMMITTEE 



Gordon G. Lill, Chairman of the AMSOC Committee; Geophysics Branch, OflSce 

 of Naval Research, T-3, Washington, D.C. 



WiLLARD Bascom, technical director for the Committee. 



Dr. Maurice Ewing, Lament Geological Observatory, Palisades, N.Y. 



Dr. William B. Heroy, the Geotechnical Corp., Dallas, Tex. 



Dr. Harry H. Hess, Department of Geology, Princeton University, Princeton, 

 N.J. 



Dr. Harry S. Ladd, U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. National Museum, Washington, 

 D.C. 



Dr. Arthur E. Maxwell, Geophysics Branch, OflSce of Naval Research, Wash- 

 ington, D.C. 



Dr. Walter Munk, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, Calif. 



Dr. Roger Revelle, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, Calif. 



Dr. William W. Rubey, U.S. Geological Survey, Washington, D.C. 



Dr. Joshua I. Tracey, U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. National Museum, Wash- 

 ington, D.C. 



Dr. Leonard S. Wilson, OCRD, U.S. Army, the Pentagon, Washington, D.C. 



George Colchagoff, Major, USAF, Astrodynamics Section, Headquarters, 

 ARDC, Andrews Air Force Base, Md. 



Mr. Bascom. Might I call your attention to table 1 and figure 2 

 which follow thereafter. 



Looking at table 1 you will see it is divided between the Atlantic and 

 Pacific Oceans. 



Under phase 1, taking the first column, one of the best sites we know 

 about so far is the so-called Clipperton Island area. 



At that point the depth of water is approximately 10,000 feet. 



The depth to the bottom of the sediment is 10,400 feet. 



The depth to the bottom of the second layer is 13,800 feet. 



Henceforth, we are in the third layer which is milniown, so it means 

 a rig which could at that particular point reach downward something 

 on the order of 15,000 feet could, in effect, sample all of the layers, 

 including the third layer, and tell us considerable about the crust of 

 the earth. 



I will not go through the rest of the items on that table since that is 

 only an explanation of how it looks. 



On figure 2 we see the crust of the earth so that we can compare the 

 continental depths with oceanic depths. The deepest oil well is shown 

 as being drilled in a sedimentary basin to 25,000 feet. 



You can compare generally the chances of getting through the 

 continental crust with the chances of getting through the oceanic 

 crust. 



Perhaps now we should hear what Mr. Gordon Lill would like to 

 tell us about the scientific part of the project. 



Mr. Lill. I wanted to make a few remarks, Mr. Chairman, and I 

 have prepared here some rather pretty pictures. 



In the first place, I w^anted to emphasize again that the project 

 we are talking about, the Mohole project, is purely a scientific proj- 

 ect. It has no otlier implications so far as we know at the moment 

 other than scientific. 



In this connection the AMSOC Committee, and various earth sci- 

 entists interested in this ])roject, look upon our earth as a prototype 

 planet. We feel it beliooves us to find out as much about this planet 

 as we can. 



Practically all the physical information we have about the interior 

 of the earth is contained on this chart. Here you see the earth is cut 



