Gravity Hole

I dunno. Does this belong in the "Crap Science in the Era of Trump" category?
https://futurism.com/the-byte/scientists-intrigued-gravity-hole-bottom-ocean

Quote :

In a new study published in Geophysical Research Letters, Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore Attreyee Ghosh and doctoral student Debanjan Pal examined the dip, finding that the sea level of the surrounding ocean is almost 350 feet lower than the global average.

I find it impossible to believe "sea level" actually varies by 350 feet in this area.

Scientific American (as usual) explains it better:

Scientific American wrote:

There’s a massive “hole” in the Indian Ocean, researchers say—but it’s not the kind that could drain away all that water. Instead it’s a term geologists use to describe a spot where Earth’s gravity is lower than average. And a new study may have finally revealed its origins: it appears to be caused by plumes of molten rock rising from deep beneath Africa at the edges of the sinking remnants of an ancient ocean bed.

And yet what follows makes no fucking sense:

Scientific American wrote:

A pronounced dip in the geoid under the Indian Ocean—called the Indian Ocean geoid low (IOGL)—is the planet’s most prominent gravitational anomaly. It covers more than three million square kilometers and is centered about 1,200 km southwest of the southern tip of India. (Its enormity, as well as the fact that the ocean looks relatively flat at any given point, means the dip isn’t visible at the surface.) As a result of the low pull of gravity there, combined with the higher gravitational pull from the surrounding areas, the sea level of the Indian Ocean over the hole is a whopping 106 meters lower than the global average, says the new study’s senior author Attreyee Ghosh, a geophysicist at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bangalore.

Why would LOWER gravitational pull create LOWER sea levels?

Sea level varies by 8 to 12 feet — not 350.
https://climate.nasa.gov/explore/ask-nasa-climate/2990/sea-level-101-what-determines-the-level-of-the-sea/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CMost%20of%20these%2020%2Dto,slowing%20down%2C%E2%80%9D%20he%20said.

Viz. crap science. Thought so.