The Misteriosa Bank ( es, Placer de la Misteriosa)''Derrotero de las islas Antillas, de las costas de Tierra Firme y de las del Seno Mexicano'' p. 420
/ref> is a submerged bank or

atoll An atoll () is a ring-shaped island, including a coral rim that encircles a lagoon partially or completely. There may be coral islands or cays on the rim. Atolls are located in warm tropical or subtropical oceans and seas where corals can gr ...

in the

Caribbean Sea The Caribbean Sea ( es, Mar Caribe; french: Mer des Caraïbes; ht, Lanmè Karayib; jam, Kiaribiyan Sii; nl, Caraïbische Zee; pap, Laman Karibe) is a sea of the Atlantic Ocean in the tropics of the Western Hemisphere. It is bounded by Mexico ...

, located at – approximately equidistant from

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

(), Honduras () and

Cuba Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbea ...

().

Geographical data

The Misteriosa Bank is long and wide. Its area is . tp://rock.geosociety.org/pub/reposit/2001/2001075.pdf Atoll area, depth and rainfall/ref> Immediately south of it is

Rosario Bank Rosario Bank is a former atoll in the southern Caribbean Sea, located less than 20 km south of Misteriosa Bank. It is in Honduras' exclusive economic zone. Rosario Bank is roughly rectangular in extent, being 16 kilometers long east-west, and e ...

. The closest piece of land is the

Swan Islands, Honduras The Swan Islands, or Islas Santanilla or Islas del Cisne, initially named Islas de las Pozas by Christopher Columbus in 1502, is a chain of three islands located in the northwestern Caribbean Sea, approximately off the coastline of Honduras, wi ...

, to the south and separated from it by the more than

Cayman Trough __NOTOC__ The Cayman Trough (also known as the Cayman Trench, Bartlett Deep and Bartlett Trough) is a complex transform fault zone pull-apart basin which contains a small spreading ridge, the Mid-Cayman Rise, on the floor of the western Caribbea ...

. The reported depth is on the average or up to , with depths of along the rim, or . It is part of the

Cayman Ridge The Cayman Ridge is an undersea mountain range on the northern margin of the Cayman Trough in the Caribbean Sea. It extends from the Sierra Maestra in the east to the Misteriosa Bank in the west, a distance of about . The Cayman Ridge also inclu ...

History

The bank was first reported by Spanish navigator Tomás Nicolás de Villa in April 1787. In the 19th century

Charles Darwin Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all species of life have descended ...

mentioned the Misteriosa Bank as an example of the sharply declining coral reef in his work ''Coral Reefs'':Darwin, Charles; ''Coral Reefs'', Appendix 5, ''West Indies''
Currently a buoy has been anchored to the seabed of this submerged peak of a sea mountain range that appears to have been claimed by the Principality of

New Utopia New Utopia, officially the Principality of New Utopia, is a micronation claiming the Misteriosa Bank, an unclaimed undersea rise of land in the Caribbean Sea off the Cayman Islands where it is hoped to build structures raised up from the unde ...

. The placing of the buoy was filmed by a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

film crew and broadcast by

Arte Arte (; (), sometimes stylized in lowercase or uppercase in its logo) is a European public service channel dedicated to culture. It is made up of three separate companies: the Strasbourg-based European Economic Interest Grouping ARTE, plu ...

television on

satellite A satellite or artificial satellite is an object intentionally placed into orbit in outer space. Except for passive satellites, most satellites have an electricity generation system for equipment on board, such as solar panels or radioi ...

. New Utopia maintains no state claims and wants to build a form of

micronation A micronation is a political entity whose members claim that they belong to an independent nation or sovereign state, but which lacks legal recognition by world governments or major international organizations. Micronations are classified ...

on top of it, using concrete blocks.

References

External links

NASA picture showing Misteriosa Bank

---- Landforms of the Cayman Islands Atolls of the North Atlantic Ocean Atolls of the United Kingdom {{Marine-geo-stub

Geographical data

History

See also

References

External links