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What Ozone Does
Ozone is a gaseous compound made up of three oxygen atoms. Because ozone is only made of oxygen, a light element on the periodic table, ozone rises above the air that is breathed by animals on the Earth. The air that life forms on Earth breathe in is much heavier because it has oxygen, carbon dioxide and nitrogen in it. The ozone that has risen above the lower atmosphere is thick enough to have enveloped the Earth's atmosphere. This is called the ozone layer.
The Ozone Layer
The ozone layer acts as a shield for the Earth. It is able to repel a form of solar radiation known as ultraviolet-B rays. These rays are bounced off ozone molecules, allowing the planet's atmosphere to never absorb this form of radiation. According to the Sustainable Scale Project, the main reason life on Earth can even survive is because ozone protects life forms from this dangerous, cancer-causing form of radiation. Human actions, however, have caused damage to the ozone layer since the beginning of the industrial age.
Human Actions
The human race, through rapid industrialization, has negatively influenced the ozone layer. Human actions such as emitting chlorofluorocarbons, a chlorine-based compound, have harmed the level of ozone in the atmosphere. Chlorofluorocarbons, which used to be emitted from objects like refrigerators, rose to the ozone layer. There, the chlorofluorocarbons broke down to pure chlorine on an atomic level because of the ultraviolet light. Chlorine, when it hits ozone, destroys the ozone compound. This resulted, over the span of most of the 20th century, in a rapid deterioration of ozone and the increase of ultraviolet energy entering the Earth.
The Hole
NASA reports that there is actually no "hole" in the ozone layer. If there was a hole, that would technically mean there is a space in the atmosphere where no ozone is detected and radiation from the sun freely enters the Earth. Instead, the "hole" term is used to describe how the ozone layer across the world is depleted relative to the amount of ozone that should typically be in the atmosphere if there were no human involvement in emitting ozone-destroying chemicals.
Why It Is Called a Hole
The reason people know or call it a hole in the ozone layer is because some parts of the world experience much higher levels of ozone depletion than others. The region of the Earth that contains all of Antarctica endures long months of stratospheric winds that encircle Antarctica. This results in much of the chlorine from across the world accumulating in one spot over a long period of time. The phenomenon results much higher ozone depletion over Antarctica compared to the rest of the world. But this does not remove the ozone completely over Antarctica; instead, environmental damage has risen as a result of ultraviolet light melting much of the Antarctic ice.