The oceans are held in by a vast 60,000 mile long - 150 foot high Ice Wall which encircles the earth. The nearly vertical ice front to the open sea is more than 50 meters high above the water's surface.
The Ross Ice Wall was named after Sir James Clark Ross, a polar explorer who was among the first to venture to Antarctica in an attempt to determine the position of the South Magnetic Pole. Upon confronting the massive vertical front of of ice he famously remarked 'Well, there's no more chance of sailing through that than through the cliffs of Dover.'
James Clark Ross and his expeditionary fleet sailed around the Ice Wall for a number of months. Between pit stops in Europe and his polar expeditions, he spent the next five years of his life vainly in search of a south sea passage to the other side. Ross reports a circumference of over 60,000 miles.
Beyond the 150 foot Ice Wall is anyone's guess. Some hold that the tundra of ice and snow stretches forever into infinity.
Edge of the known world:
http://uwamrc.ssec.wisc.edu/images/gallery/B15Aedge.jpgTemperatures approach absolute zero the further one explores outwards. Exploration in that type of pitch black freezing environment is impossible for any man or machine. We live on a vast plane with an unknown diameter and an unknown depth. Dr. Samuel Birley Rowbotham held that knowing the true dimensions of the earth is something which will be forever be unknowable by man.
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