Continental drift Continental drift Continental drift is the theory that the Earth's continents have moved over geologic time relative to each other, thus appearing to have "drifted" across the ocean bed. The speculation that continents might have 'drifted' was first put forward by Abraham Ortelius in 1596. The concept was independently and more fully developed by Alfred Wegener in 1912, but his theory was rejected by many for lack of any motive mechanism. Arthur Holmes later proposed mantle convection for that mechanism. The idea of continental drift has since been subsumed by the theory of plate tectonics, which explains that the continents
Drift whale whale is no longer a benefit to a community, but an expensive disadvantage. Many cetacean species have been documented as drift whales, but some are more common than others. In New England, for example, the carcasses of fin, humpback, sperm, right, and pilot whales, as well as dolphins, are most likely to drift ashore. Some species have a naturally high buoyancy, and float when they are dead, aided by the gases of putrefaction. Whales that live in the pelagic ocean, far from the continental shelf, are less likely to wash up ashore than coastal species. Once these deep-sea animals do