The earth was once mostly covered with water?

[SHRED]

That's my understanding.

Question:
Where did all the water go?

[WheelWalker]

1. I think it is still mostly covered with water. Maybe surface irregularity affects coverage area?

[SHRED]

2. My understanding (which is very limited obviously)...

...is that much more water covered the earth than now.

I wonder if the earth expanded as mountains rose up?

[shraby]

3. At one time most of the land was in one big blob and the rest was water. Continental drift

changed all that. As the big blob broke up and moved apart creating individual continents and shoving up mountains in the process, the various seas came into being.
The ratio of land to water was probably pretty much the same as now, just looked different.

Just a guess.

[SHRED]

4. I find it fascinating that ocean fossils are found...

...as high as on Mt Everest.

[progree]

5. God put them there to test our faith, as I recall from my Jesus Science class

I find it fascinating that ocean fossils are found... ...as high as on Mt Everest.

[SHRED]

6. LOL

Good one.

[TheMastersNemesis]

7. There Were Fewer Land Masses Before Continents Rose & Were Formed.

T?hat answer would be the best. Were it not for huge irregularities we would not have land masses. Remember the "water world" movies.

If the solid mass of the earth were totally smooth I wont how deep the water would be. There would likely be no dry land.

[MFM008]

8. Did you see

Or read Journey to the Center of the Earth?
A great underground ocean?
There's one put there somewhere.

[Boomer]

10. Joke right?

I'm assuming you're just making a funny, although it's not clear from your tone.

[MFM008]

13. Anything

Is possible. A large amount of water trapped due to a crack or a blister . We know smaller ones as aquifers.
Yesterday's sci go writers are today's prophets.

Ps. Geology was my major in college.

[defacto7]

15. Check post 14

[defacto7]

14. There may be three times as much water

below earth's surface than in the ocean...

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/jun/13/earth-may-have-underground-ocean-three-times-that-on-surface

Water at depths of 400 to 600 miles below surface.

[Boomer]

9. Are any true geologits going to answer this?

There's a large amount of that water locked up in glaciers and the polar ice caps. One of the major concerns for global warming is that those ice reserves will melt, thus raising ocean sea levels and covering more land.

[defacto7]

11. Two other possibilities

Much has gone underground with tectonic shifts, and some evaporates into space over time.

[SHRED]

12. I was wondering if it made out to space

Thanks

[hunter]

16. It's complicated.

The continents of earth, the land areas, are less dense rock floating on heavier rock. Continents break apart and recombine. High mountains and deep oceanic trenches form and reform.

Water also gets chemically combined with rock, and is released again by volcanic activity.

Snowball Earth is mostly covered with water. So are various continental configurations, with shallow seas covering low density continental rock.