Atlantic Ocean, the second largest of the Earth’s oceans (the Pacific is approximately twice as large) and

the most heavily traveled. It is divided into two nominal sections by the Equator, the North Atlantic and
the South Atlantic. The ocean’s name is derived from Atlas (Mythol.), one of the Titans of Greek
mythology.

Area: About 34 million mi2 (88 million km2).

Greatest distances:North-south--9,000 mi (14,500 km) excluding the Arctic Ocean, or 13,300 mi (21,400
km) including the Arctic Ocean. East-west--5,500 mi (8,800 km).
Average depth: 12,100 ft (3,700 m).
Greatest depth: 28,232 ft (8,605 m) in the Puerto Rico Trench.
Surface temperatures:Highest, about 86 degrees F (30 degrees C), near the equator in summer. Lowest,
28 degrees F (–2 degrees C), at and near the boundary with the Southern Ocean in winter.
Tides:Highest--Over 50 ft (15 m), in the Bay of Fundy and Ungava Bay, Canada. Lowest--less than 1.5 ft
(0.5 m) in areas of the Gulf of Mexico and the Mediterranean Sea.
Facts in brief about the Atlantic Ocean

Boundaries and Size

The Atlantic Ocean is essentially an S-shaped N-S channel, extending from the Arctic Ocean in the N to
the Southern Ocean in the S and situated between the E coast of the American continents and the W
coast of Europe and Africa. The Atlantic was traditionally considered to extend S to Antarctica, but more
recent usage distinguishes the Southern Ocean as a separate entity.

The Atlantic Ocean, as presently defined, has a total area of about 76.8 million sq km (29.6 million sq
mi). Marginal seas and other water bodies in the Atlantic Ocean include the Baltic Sea, Black Sea,
Caribbean Sea, Davis Strait, Denmark Strait, part of Drake Passage, Gulf of Mexico, Labrador Sea,
Mediterranean Sea, North Sea, Norwegian Sea, and nearly all of the Scotia Sea. The Kiel Canal
(Germany), the Øresund (Denmark-Sweden), Bosporus and Dardanelles (Turkey), Strait of Gibraltar
(Morocco-Spain), and the Saint Lawrence Seaway (Canada-U.S.) are important strategic waterways. The
Nord-Ostsee Kanal.(Kiel Canal), linking the North and the Baltic Seas, is the world’s most heavily used
artificial waterway. The Saint Lawrence Seaway (NE U.S. and SE Canada) is also an important waterway,
and the Intracoastal Waterway (the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico intracoastal waterways) has
significant commercial and touristic use.

The boundary between the North Atlantic and the Arctic Ocean is arbitrarily designated as lying along a
system of submarine ridges that extend between the landmasses of Baffin Island, Greenland, Iceland,
the Faeroes, and Scotland; part of the floor (about 910 m/3000 ft deep) is known as the “telegraph
plateau” for the network of cables laid there. More clearly defined is the boundary with the
Mediterranean Sea at the Strait of Gibraltar and with the Caribbean Sea along the arc of the Antilles. The
South Atlantic is arbitrarily separated from the Indian Ocean on the E by the 20°E meridian and from the
Pacific on the W along the line of shallowest depth between Cape Horn and the Antarctic Peninsula; its
boundary with the Southern Ocean was placed at 60°S latitude by the International Hydrographic
Organization in 2000.

Geologic Formation and Structural Features

The Atlantic began to form during the Jurassic Period (about 199.6 million to 145.5 million years ago),
when a rift opened up in the supercontinent of Gondwanaland, resulting in the separation of South
America and Africa. The separation continues today at the rate of several centimeters a year along the
Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Part of the midoceanic ridge system that girdles the world, it is a submarine ridge
extending N-S in a sinuous path midway between the continents. Roughly 1500 km (about 930 mi) wide,
the ridge has a more rugged topography than any mountain range on land, and is a locus of volcanic
eruptions and earthquakes. The basic profile of the ridge ranges between heights of about 1 and 3 km
(about 0.6 and 2 mi) above the ocean bottom. Scientific knowledge of the world’s ocean floor dates
from the British expedition taking place from 1872 to 1876 on the first oceanographic research vessel,
the Challenger. Among many discoveries, which opened the era of scientific oceanography, was that of
the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

Along the ocean’s coastline are the continental shelves—embankments of the debris washed from the
continents. Submarine ridges and rises extend roughly E-W between the continental shelves and the
Mid-Atlantic Ridge dividing the E and W ocean floors into a series of basins, also known as abyssal plains.
The three basins on the American side of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge are more than 5000 m (more than
16,400 ft) deep: the North American Basin, the Brazil Basin, and the Argentina Basin. The Eurafrican side
is marked by several basins that are smaller but just as deep: the Iberia, Canaries, Cape Verde, Sierra
Leone, Guinea, Angola, Cape, and Agulhas basins. The large Atlantic-Antarctic Basin lies between the
southernmost extension of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and the Antarctic continent.

The Atlantic Ocean has a mean depth of 3926 m (12,881 ft), a figure that represents the average depth
of a rugged and complex topography. At its deepest point, the Milwaukee Deep in the Puerto Rico
Trench, the bottom is 8605 m (28,231 ft) below the surface.

Islands

The largest islands of the Atlantic Ocean lie on the continental shelves. Newfoundland is the principal
island on the North American shelf; the British Isles are the major island group of the Eurafrican shelf.
Other continental islands include the Falkland Islands, the only major group on the South American
shelf, and the South Sandwich Islands on the Antarctic shelf.

Oceanic islands, usually of volcanic origin, are less common in the Atlantic Ocean than in the Pacific.
Among these are the Antilles (including Puerto Rico, Hispaniola, Jamaica, and Cuba), which are peaks of
a system of interrupted submarine ridges. In the E Atlantic, the Madeiras, Canaries, Cape Verde, and the
São Tomé-Príncipe group are the peaks of other submarine ridges. The Azores, Saint Paul’s Rocks,
Ascension, and the Tristan da Cunha group are isolated peaks of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge system; the large
island of Iceland is also the result of volcanic action at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Bermuda rises from the
floor of the North American Basin, and Saint Helena from the Angola Basin.

Currents
The circulatory system of the surface waters of the Atlantic can be depicted as two large gyres, or
circular current systems, one in the North Atlantic and one in the South Atlantic. These currents are
primarily wind driven, but their direction is affected by the rotation of the Earth (seeOcean and
Oceanography). The currents of the North Atlantic, which include the North Equatorial Current, Antilles
Current, the Canaries Current, and the Gulf Stream, flow in a clockwise direction. The currents in the
South Atlantic, among which are the Brazil, Benguela, and South Equatorial travel in a counterclockwise
direction. The two current systems are separated by the Equatorial Counter Current, while the Guinea
Current (off W Africa) is a link between them. At the Grand Banks (off Newfoundland) heavy fogs and
whirlpools form along the front where the warm Gulf Stream mingles with the cold Labrador Current.

The Atlantic receives the waters of many of the principal rivers of the world, among them the Saint
Lawrence, Mississippi, Orinoco, Amazon, Paraná, Congo, Niger, and Loire and the rivers emptying into
the North, Baltic, and Mediterranean seas. Nevertheless, primarily because of the high salinity of
outflow from the Mediterranean, the Atlantic is slightly more saline than the Pacific or Indian oceans.

Temperatures

The Atlantic Ocean may be described as a bed of water colder than 9° C (48° F)—the cold water sphere
—within which lies a bubble of water warmer than 9° C—the warm water sphere. The warm water
sphere extends between lat 50° N and lat 50° S and has an average thickness of about 600 m (about
2000 ft). The most active circulation is found in the uppermost layer of warm water. Below this,
circulation becomes increasingly sluggish as the temperature decreases.

Surface temperatures range from 0° C (32° F), found year-round at the N and S margins, to 27° C (81° F)
in the broad belt at the equator. At depths below 2000 m (about 6600 ft), temperatures of 2° C (36° F)
are prevalent; in bottom waters, below 4000 m (about 13,200 ft), temperatures of –1° C (30° F) are
common. Icebergs are common in Davis Strait, Denmark Strait, and the northwestern Atlantic Ocean
from February to August. The hurricane season lasts from May to December.

Marine Resources

The Atlantic Ocean contains some of the world’s most productive fisheries, located on the continental
shelves and marine ridges off the British Isles, Iceland, Canada (especially the Grand Banks), and the NE
United States. Upwelling areas, in which the nutrient-rich waters of the ocean depths flow up to the
surface, as in the vicinity of Walvis Bay off SW Africa, also have abundant sea life. Herring, anchovy,
sardine, cod, flounder, and perch are the most important commercial species. Tuna is taken off NW
Africa and NE South America in increasing numbers. The catch per unit area is much higher in the
Atlantic than in the other oceans.

A remarkable example of plant life is found in the Sargasso Sea, the oval section of the North Atlantic
lying between the West Indies and the Azores and bounded on the W and N by the Gulf Stream. Here
extensive patches of brown gulfweed (Sargassum) are found on the relatively still surface waters.

Actively mined mineral resources in the Atlantic include titanium, zircon, and monazite (phosphates of
the cerium metals), off the E coast of Florida, and tin and iron ore, off the equatorial coast of Africa. The
continental shelves and slopes of the Atlantic are very rich in fossil fuels. Large amounts of petroleum
are already being extracted in the North Sea and in the Caribbean Sea-Gulf of Mexico region; lesser
amounts are extracted off the coast of Africa in the Gulf of Guinea.
Major pollutants (including sewage, industrial waste, and municipal sludge), exploitation of offshore oil,
and other activities have contributed to a deterioration of marine life in the Atlantic. Drift net fishing,
which is said to have caused a decline of fish stocks in the Atlantic, is becoming a matter of international
dispute.____________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Pacific Ocean, the largest and deepest of the earth’s oceans, covering more than a third of the earth’s
surface and containing more than half of its free water. It is sometimes divided into two nominal
sections: the part N of the equator is called the North Pacific; the part S of the equator, the South
Pacific. The name Pacific (“peaceful”) was given to it by the Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan,
whose crossing of the Pacific (1520–21) helped open up a new era of exploration and trade. Major
Pacific ports include Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Seattle (U.S), Tokyo-Yokohama (Japan), Hong Kong
and Shanghai (China), Manila (Philippines), Pusan (South Korea), Singapore, Sydney (Australia),
Vladivostok (Russia), Wellington (New Zealand), and Bangkok (Thailand). The International Date Line
passes through the Pacific Ocean close to the 180th meridian.

Boundaries and Size

The Pacific Ocean is bounded on the E by the North and South American continents; on the N by the
Bering Strait; on the W by Asia, the Malay Archipelago, and Australia, and on the S by the Southern
Ocean, which in 2000 was officially delimited as a separate ocean below 60° S latitude by the
International Hydrographic Organization. In the SE the Pacific is arbitrarily divided from the Atlantic
Ocean by the Drake Passage along 68° W long, while in the SW, it is separated from the Indian Ocean.

The total area of the Pacific Ocean is 155.6 million sq km (60.1 million sq mi); even with the subtraction
of the Southern Ocean it is still somewhat larger than the entire land surface of the globe. Its greatest
width is about 17,700 km (about 11,000 mi) from Panama to the Malay Peninsula, and its mean depth is
4282 m (14,049 ft). The greatest known depth in any ocean is in the Pacific Ocean in the Mariana
Trench, 402 km (250 mi) SW of Guam. It was named the Challenger Deep for the Challenger expedition
of 1872-76, which provided it first measurement. The measurement considered to be the most accurate
—10,911 m (35,797 ft)—was taken by a Japanese robotic probe in 1995.

Geologic Formation and Structural Features

The Pacific is the oldest of the existing ocean basins, its oldest rocks having been dated at about 200
million years. The major features of the basin and rim have been shaped by the phenomena associated
with Plate Tectonics. The coastal shelf, which extends to depths of about 180 m (about 600 ft), is narrow
along North and South America but is relatively wide along Asia and Australia. The East Pacific Rise, a
submarine ridge-and-trough system, extends some 9650 km (about 6000 mi) from Antarctica to the Gulf
of California, and rises an average of about 2130 m (about 7000 ft) above the ocean floor. Along the East
Pacific Rise molten rock upwells from the earth’s mantle adding crust to the Pacific and Nazca plates on
both sides of the rise. These plates, which are huge segments of the earth’s surface, are thus forced
apart, causing them to collide with the continental plates adjacent to their outer edges. Under this
tremendous pressure, the continental plates fold into mountains, and the oceanic plates downbuckle,
forming deep trenches (subduction zones) from which crust is carried back into the mantle (see Earth:
Composition). The stresses at the areas of folding and subduction are responsible for the earthquakes
and volcanoes that give the rim of the Pacific basin the name “ring of fire” (see Ocean and
Oceanography).

Islands

The Pacific Ocean contains more than 30,000 islands; their total land area, however, amounts to only
one-quarter of one percent of the ocean’s surface area. The largest islands, in the W region, form
volcanic island arcs that rise from the broad continental shelf along the eastern edge of the Eurasian
Plate (see Plate Tectonics). They include Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines, Indonesia, New Guinea, and
New Zealand. The oceanic islands, collectively called Oceania, are the tops of mountains built up from
the ocean basin by extruding molten rock. The mountains that remain submerged are called seamounts.
In many areas, particularly the South Pacific, the land features above the sea surface are accretions of
shell material (see Coral Reef). Along the E edge of the Pacific, the continental shelf is narrow and steep,
with few island areas. The major groups are the Galápagos at the equator, which rise from the Nazca
Plate, and the Aleutians in the N, which are part of the North American continental shelf.

Currents

The driving forces for ocean currents are the earth’s rotation, wind friction at the surface of the water,
and variations in seawater density due to differences in temperature and salinity. The interaction
between wind and current has a major effect on climate and is studied for long-range weather
prediction and for sea travel.

The surface currents of the North Pacific consist of two gyres, or circular systems. In the extreme N the
counterclockwise Subarctic Gyre encompasses the westward-flowing Alaska Current and the eastward-
flowing Subarctic Current. The main body of the North Pacific, however, is dominated by the huge North
Central Gyre, which circulates clockwise. It encompasses the North Pacific Current, flowing E, the
California Current, flowing W, and the Kuroshio (or Japan) Current, flowing N up the coast of Japan. The
California Current is cold, broad, and slow moving; the Kuroshio is warm, narrow, and rapid, similar to
the Gulf Stream. Close to the equator at 5° N lat, the eastward-flowing Equatorial Countercurrent
separates the North and South Pacific systems but sends most of its waters into the North Equatorial
Current.

The South Pacific is dominated by the counterclockwise-moving South Central Gyre, which encompasses
the South Equatorial Current flowing E and S, the South Pacific Current flowing W, and the Mentor
Current flowing N, parallel to South America. Located in the extreme S is the Antarctic Circumpolar
Current (West Wind Drift), which encircles the globe, merging the waters of the Pacific, Atlantic, and
Indian oceans. It is the most important source of deep-sea circulation. From it flows the broad, cold Peru
(or Humboldt) Current, which travels N along the coast of South America and sends its waters into the
South Equatorial Current.

Wind Systems

The outstanding wind systems of the Pacific Ocean are the twin belts of westerlies, which blow from W
to E between 30° and 60° lat, one in the northern hemisphere and one in the southern hemisphere.
These winds vary in seasonal patterns. The stormy and unpredictable westerly of the North Central
Pacific is being studied for possible controlling effect on global weather patterns. Between the westerlies
are the much more steady trade winds, which move from the E in the northern hemisphere and from
the W in the southern hemisphere. Violent tropical storms, which are called typhoons in the W Pacific
and hurricanes in the S and E Pacific, originate in the trade wind belt in late summer and early autumn.
Located at the equator are the equatorial doldrums, light winds with seasonal cyclonic activity. At the
highest latitudes of the Pacific, the winds have little direct effect on climate and water currents.

Resources

Much of the plant and animal life of the Pacific Ocean is concentrated along its margins. Nutrient-rich
waters from the deep Antarctic Circumpolar Current upwell to the surface in the Peru Current along the
coast of Chile and Peru, and the area sustains a large population of anchovetas that is of great
importance as a world food resource. A large guano industry has been established from droppings of the
seabirds that feed upon the anchovetas. The NW Pacific, including the Sea of Japan and the Sea of
Okhotsk, is another major world fishery. Coral reefs rich with sea life reach their peak in the Great
Barrier Reef, which extends for about 2010 km (about 1250 mi) along the NE coast of Australia. Tuna is
another important Pacific resource, bringing fleets of many nations in search of the schools that migrate
over much of the ocean. The Pacific has also begun to be exploited for its vast mineral resources. The
continental shelves located off the coasts of California, Alaska, China, and the Indonesian area are
known to contain large reserves of petroleum. Patches of the ocean floor are covered with “manganese
nodules,” potato-sized concretions of iron and manganese oxides that sometimes also contain copper,
cobalt, and nickel. Programs are under way to examine the feasibility of mining these deposits.

Arctic Ocean, variously identified as the smallest of four world oceans or as a virtually landlocked arm of
the Atlantic Ocean. It extends from the North Pole S to the shores of Europe, Asia, and North America.

Boundaries and Size

The surface waters of the Arctic Ocean mingle with those of the Pacific Ocean through the Bering Strait,
by way of a narrow and shallow channel, which has a depth of about 55 m (about 180 ft). More
important is the mixing of Arctic waters with those of the Atlantic Ocean across a system of submarine
ridges that span the great distances from S Norway to Greenland and from Greenland to Baffin Island at
depths of about 500 to 700 m (about 1640 to 2300 ft). Emptying into the Arctic Ocean are the Ob,
Yenisey, and Lena rivers in Asia and the Mackenzie R. in North America. The total surface area of the
Arctic Ocean, including its various seas, is about 14 million sq km (about 5.4 million sq mi).

Structural Features

Approximately one-third of the Arctic Ocean is underlain by continental shelf, which includes a broad
shelf N of Eurasia and the narrower shelves of North America and Greenland. Seaward of the
continental shelves lies the Arctic Basin proper, which is subdivided into a set of three parallel ridges and
four basins (or deeps). These features have only been discovered and explored since the late 1940s. The
Lomonosov Ridge, the major ridge, cuts the North Polar Sea almost in half, extending as a submarine
bridge 1700 km (1060 mi) from Siberia to the NW tip of Greenland. Parallel to the Lomonosov are two
shorter ridges: the Alpha Ridge on the North American side, which defines the Canada and Makarov
basins, and the Mid-Ocean Ridge on the Eurasian side, which defines the Nansen and Fram basins. The
mean depth of the Arctic Ocean is only about 1500 m (about 4900 ft) because of the vast shallow
expanses on the continental shelves. The deepest sounding in the Arctic is 5450 m (17,880 ft).

Islands

The islands of the Arctic Ocean lie on the continental shelves. To the NE of Norway lies Svalbard
(Spitsbergen); to the E are Franz Josef Land, Novaya Zemlya, Severnaya Zemlya, the New Siberian
Islands, and Wrangel Island, all of which are located N of Russia. The numerous islands of the Canadian
Archipelago extend N and E from the Canadian mainland to Greenland, the largest island of the Arctic
Ocean.

Ice

Three forms of ice are found in the Arctic Ocean: land ice, river ice, and sea ice. Land ice enters the
ocean in the form of icebergs, which are created (primarily along the coasts of Greenland) when pieces
of glaciers break off. The freezing of fresh water, and its subsequent transport into the ocean by rivers,
produces nearshore concentrations of river ice over small areas of the Siberian and North American
shelves. Sea ice (formed by the freezing of seawater) is the most extensive form of ice in the Arctic
Ocean. In winter a permanent cap of sea ice covers all of the ocean surface, except for the area NE of
Iceland and N of Scandinavia. In summer the ice cover shrinks to expose narrow bands of relatively open
water along the coasts of most of Siberia, Alaska, and Canada. The ice cap is composed of pieces of ice
that pile up and are pressed (hence, the name pack ice) in ridges or hummocks that may be more than
10 m (33 ft) in depth.

Resources

Fish, in commercially exploitable quantities, are found only in the warmer marginal seas, notably in the
North Sea (herring, cod, and flounder) and the Barents Sea (primarily cod). Sea mammals, including
various species of seal and whale, were hunted to near extinction before being protected by quotas in
the 20th century. Tin is actively mined off the coast of E Siberia, and petroleum and natural gas are
extracted N of Alaska and Canada and in the North Sea.

Southern Ocean, designated in 2000 by the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) as a separate
ocean, encircling the continent of Antarctica, and consisting of the portion of the Pacific, Atlantic, and
Indian oceans below 60° S. latitude. As thus defined it encompasses 360° of longitude and is the world’s
fourth largest ocean, bigger than the Arctic Ocean but smaller than the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian
oceans. The demarcation line separating the Southern Ocean from the southward extension of the three
larger oceans to the north stretches along the Antarctic Convergence (or the Polar Front), a distinct zone
where the cold waters transported by the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, or the West Wind Drift, meet
and mingle with the warmer waters of the north. The Convergence has the effect of concentrating
nutrients that promote an increased abundance of plant and animal life, and the Southern Ocean is
considered to be an ecologically separate and distinct body of water. However, not all sources
distinguish that body as having a separate identity as an ocean.

The Southern Ocean as defined includes the Amundsen Sea, the Bellingshausen Sea, part of the Drake
Passage, Ross Sea, a small portion of the Scotia Sea, and Weddell Sea. The Southern Ocean has a total
area of 20.3 million sq km (7.8 million sq mi) and an average depth between about 4000m (13,000 ft)
and 5000 m (16,400 ft), with the lowest point at 7235 m (23,736 ft) at the southern end of the South
Sandwich Trench. The ocean area from about latitude 40° S to the Antarctic Circle (66°30´ S) has the
strongest average winds found anywhere on Earth; strong cyclonic storm travel always eastward around
Antarctic, their strength being caused by the contrast temperature between ice and open ocean.

Geologically, the Southern Ocean is the youngest of the oceans. It formed about 30 million years ago,
when Antarctica and South America separated, opening the Drake Passage, and thus allowing the
formation of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current—the world’s largest ocean current at about 21,000 km
(13,000 mi) long, and the most rapid, having 100 times the flow of all the world’s rivers.

Ice conditions on the southern side of Southern Ocean, even during midsummer, limit the development
of ports or harbors; the existing ones are operated by the research stations. Natural resources include
vast oil and gas fields on the continental shelf; other minerals; fresh water as icebergs; squid, whales,
and seals; krill, and fishes. The Southern Ocean is also one of the world’s biggest “carbon sinks,” or
reservoirs of carbon dioxide, keeping large quantities of this gas outside the atmosphere, where it can
contribute to global warming (see also Greenhouse Effect). Research published in 2007 suggested that
the capacity of the Southern Ocean for further absorption of carbon dioxide is severely limited, raising
environmental concerns.

In addition to all international agreements regarding the world’s oceans, the Southern Ocean is subject
to the Antarctic Treaty (see Antarctica) and other agreements specific to the Antarctic region, which
include regulations that restrict commercial whaling, seal hunting, and fishing

Indian Ocean, the third largest ocean (after the Pacific and Atlantic), constituting about 20% of the
world’s total ocean area. It is bounded on the W by the Arabian Peninsula and Africa, on the N by
southern Asia (including the Indian Peninsula, after which is named), on the E by the Malay Peninsula,
Australia and the Australasian islands, and on the S by the SOUTHERN OCEAN, which in contemporary
usage is now distinguished from the Indian and Atlantic oceans as a separate entity. The Indian Ocean is
delineated from the Atlantic by the 20º E meridian, running S from Cape Agulhas at the S end of Africa,
and from the Pacific by the 147º E meridian. The Indian Ocean is connected with the Pacific by passages
through the Malay Peninsula, and with the Atlantic by the Suez Canal.

The total area of the Indian Ocean is about 68.6 million sq km (about 26.5 million sq mi). The ocean,
about 6400 km (400 mi) wide at the equator, narrows toward the N, and is divided by the Indian
peninsula into the Bay of Bengal (with its arm, the Andaman Sea) on the E and the Arabian Sea (with the
Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, and the Persian Gulf). The mean depth of the water is about 4210 m (13,800
ft), or slightly greater than that of the Atlantic, and the greatest depth thus far ascertained is about 7725
m (25,344 ft), off S Java. In general, the greatest depths are in the NE sector of the ocean, where about
129,500 sq km (50,000 sq mi) of the ocean floor lie at a depth of more than 5486 m (18,000 ft).

The Indian Ocean contains numerous islands, the largest of which are the island nations Madagascar and
Sri Lanka; they are structurally part of the continents as are the Socotra Island (known for its unique
biodiversity) and the Andaman and Nicobar lslands. Smaller islands include the Maldive group (low coral
islands) and Mauritius and Réunion (high volcanic islands). From Africa the ocean receives the waters of
the Limpopo and Zambezi rivers, and from Asia those of the Irrawaddy, Brahmaputra, Ganges, Indus,
and Shatt al-Arab (formed by the Tigris and Euphrates) rivers. As a rule, the winds over the Indian Ocean
are gentle, with frequent protracted calms; hurricanes occur occasionally, however, particularly near
Mauritius. The ocean is notable for its Monsoon Drift, a system of currents directly related to the
seasonal shift of monsoon winds causing heavy rainfall in the Indian Peninsula and SE Asia.

The fairly easy crossing of the Indian Ocean by people and goods permitted by its waters, far calmer
than those of the Pacific and Atlantic oceans, and the pattern of monsoons (westward direction early in
the season and eastward a few months later), is attested from ancient times. In modern times, during
the 17th and 18th centuries, the Netherlands, France, and Great Britain sought to control the trade with
the East across the Indian Ocean by establishing trade companies (see East India Company), with Great
Britain becoming the dominating power around the 1820s. The Indian Ocean has been and is an
important transit route between Asia and Africa, providing major sea routes connecting the Middle East,
Africa, and East Asia with Europe and the Americas and allowing water transportation of petroleum and
petroleum products from the oil fields of the Persian Gulf and Indonesia. More that 40% of the world’s
offshore oil production comes from the Indian Ocean. Marine life is limited, a natural cause being the
warmth of the waters; overfishing for certain species as well as the oil pollution, are also factors.

The undersea earthquake that originated on Dec. 26, 2004, in the Indian Ocean, off the western coast of
Sumatra, and the resulting Tsunami, which devastated the shores of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India,
Thailand, and other countries, was one of deadliest disasters in modern history. It caused severe
damage and deaths as far as the east coast of Africa, some 8000 km (5000 mi) away from the epicenter
of the earthquake.