[mxfh]

What is it with those weird metrics? 147,000 square feet across, this is what science communication picks up from the paper?

The major axis of the TJBH at ~10 mbsl was estimated to be ~151.8 m and was oriented ~10.76° clockwise from the north, similar to the main direction of geological faults in the region. The minor axis, perpendicular to the major axis, was ~124.4 m across. The surface area covered by the blue hole is ~13,690 m2 (1.4 ha) with an external perimeter of ~492.7 m. The structure of the blue hole can be described as a conic shape that is north-skewed with a volume of ~1 million m3.

Why not about 140m (450 ft) diameter?

The full open access article is here:

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2023.1141...

[Izkata]

The conversion from square meters to square feet is 13690 * 3.28 * 3.28 = 147282.496, so at least it's the correct number for area. But yeah, adding "across" sounds weird there.

Edit: Actually for a much easier visual, it's right about 2.5 American football fields.

[kwhitefoot]

> a much easier visual, it's right about 2.5 American football fields.

One that means absolutely nothing to the majority of the people on the planet.

[0xfaded]

It's about one Australian Rules Football ground

[speedgoose]

I think it was a joke. But I’m not sure.

[Izkata]

Not a joke, the article converted from meters to feet so the demographic limitation is ~the same. Don't know why the title on HN uses metres, the original title doesn't have any size.

I only included "American" because I knew someone would jump on it with soccer/non-American football fields.

[speedgoose]

Alright. The American obsession to use random things instead of the international system of units is weird and funny so I thought you were joking about it.

[rbanffy]

> I knew someone would jump on it with soccer/non-American football fields.

There is no such thing as "soccer". The correct name is "football", because you use your feet to move the ball inside the field during the game.

There is also American football, which is an entirely different game, that's neither played with feet, or a ball.

;-P

[JdeBP]

I've made the same joke that "Rules" is so named because it doesn't have any. (-:

Having had the "soccer is what Americans call it" mantra drummed in from an early age, I was very interested to learn, only very recently, that "soccer" for Association Football has the same English upper-class slang roots as "rugger" for Rugby Football, and it's not actually an Americanism at all, as checking some old dictionaries from the 19th and early 20th centuries as well as Notes and Queries has since confirmed.

Partridge actually has a name for it, the "Oxford -er"; hence "topper" for "top hat", "header" for "heading a ball", "diner" for "dining car", "camper" for "camping car", and so forth.

So one should dislike it for the right reasons: not because it's an Americanism, which it isn't in the first place, but because it's an invention of 19th century Oxbridge toffs who stuck "-er" after the first syllable of everything as a social-class shibboleth. (-:

[CydeWeys]

You might do well to read up on the history of asSOCiation football.

[HeyLaughingBoy]

And to a lot of Americans also.

[rpeden]

To clear things up, then, it's about 1.64 Canadian football fields.

[bandyaboot]

I can’t possibly visualize its overall Size without knowing how many Olympic sized swimming pools it could fill.

[rikroots]

I need more granularity to get a sense of the volume we're talking about here. Has anyone measured it in double-decker buses yet?

[mxfh]

Large MLB fields are in that size range too: 400+ feet across dead center. https://www.si.com/mlb/2021/03/24/mlb-outfield-walls-ranked-...

[OJFord]

I think the main point was the measurement of area 'across', not the non-SI unit.

[Izkata]

The article converted all the measurements for a US audience, but the "square feet across" line halfway down is the only one they jumped on. Plus questioning why not just use diameter at the bottom of their comment.

[OJFord]

We agree then?

Edit: Oh wait, sorry, I must have misread/not read that you agreed adding 'across' was weird initially. Thought you were just saying 'sqm/sqft no big deal move on' sort of thing.

[rbanffy]

> Edit: Actually for a much easier visual, it's right about 2.5 American football fields.

OK, but how many elephants would that be?

[Izkata]

Somewhere between 1291 and 3506 adult African elephants from the measurements I found.

;D

[rbanffy]

What's the conversion from African to European elephants?

[foobarbecue]

It's not just "weird" -- it's completely nonsensical. It's like saying "the color of a stop sign is triangle"

[JdeBP]

Absolutely. Everyone knows that the colour is octagon, by international standard. (-:

[davemp]

Or ~147 avg house footprints

[chmod775]

Average house sizes vary wildly (>2x) across countries.

For the US it's 201 m2, whereas in Ireland it's 89 m2.

[davemp]

Yeah I was going with sqft —> US houses.

[havefunbesafe]

"Tim Newcomb is a journalist based in the Pacific Northwest. He covers stadiums, sneakers, gear, infrastructure, and more for a variety of publications, including Popular Mechanics."

Could be why.