Research funded in part by the History Channel in 2006 has demonstrated that
a heretofore unknown civilization may have once existed in the eastern Mediterranean
on land near the island of Cyprus. New interpretation of this data in
the last few years has led to interest in a new expedition.

Probes sent one mile down off the East coast of the Island of Cyprus in previous large-scale expeditions in 2004 and 2006—as well as oil exploration research of the ocean bottom—reveal that sunken land once bridged Cyprus to present-day Syria. Evidence of man-made structures has been found on this surface, a discovery that was hailed worldwide, and innumerable correlations with Plato’s description of ancient Atlantis have also been noted about this location. And this sunken land, according to many sources, was the actual site of the Garden of Eden of biblical fame—although some would also call this Atlantis.

This is how the effort to study this underwater site began: In 2003, a French research vessel surveyed our target area using bathymetric multibeam scan technology. Soon after, Robert Sarmast, the leader of our initial effort for many years, obtained this data for an area fifteen nautical miles square around the hypothesized capitol of this ancient civilization. A marine geophysicist working with Sarmast developed 3-D graphic images that presented a fairly detailed map of this sunken land. To create the image to the right, the geophysicist “computerized” the lowering of the water level in that end of the Mediterranean Sea, allowing a sunken area to emerge. It became visible when the sea level was lowered 1500 meters, or about one mile.

The geophysicist also enlarged the target area of the first expedition. The resulting image, at left, seemed to support Sarmast’s claim that some sort of megalithic structures existed in this region. (The height of these features is magnified ten-fold to enhance them for study.) This enlarged graphical display  depicts what appears to be a 3700-meter-long, narrow, regular, linear Y-formation (at the left of the image). In addition, to its right is a 2800-meter-long irregular low tabular mound about 110 meters high and varying between 500 to 800 meters wide. Also in evidence are scarp-like features half way up the mound, leading off to both the eastern and western sides. (A scarp is a very steep bank or slope.) This general area became the primary target of both the 2004 and 2006 expeditions.