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The Southern Ocean, also known as the Antarctic Ocean, [1] [note 4] comprises the southernmost waters of the world ocean, generally taken to be south of 60° S latitude and encircling Antarctica. [5] With a size of 21,960,000 km 2 (8,480,000 sq mi), it is the second-smallest of the five principal oceanic divisions, smaller than the Pacific ...
Geologically, an ocean is an area of oceanic crust covered by water. Oceanic crust is the thin layer of solidified volcanic basalt that covers the Earth's mantle. Continental crust is thicker but less dense. From this perspective, the Earth has three oceans: the World Ocean, the Caspian Sea, [citation needed] and the Black Sea.
About 70% of the world's freshwater reserves are frozen in Antarctica, which, if melted, would raise global sea levels by almost 60 metres (200 ft). Antarctica holds the record for the lowest measured temperature on Earth, −89.2 °C (−128.6 °F). The coastal regions can reach temperatures over 10 °C (50 °F) in the summer.
The Drake is part of the most voluminous ocean current in the world, with up to 5,300 million cubic feet flowing per second. Squeezed into the narrow passage, the current increases, traveling west ...
Antarctica is the largest ice desert in the world. Some 98% of Antarctica is covered by the Antarctic ice sheet , the world's largest ice sheet and also its largest reservoir of fresh water . Averaging at least 1.6 km thick, the ice is so massive that it has depressed the continental bedrock in some areas more than 2.5 km below sea level ...
The world’s largest iceberg is on the move again, drifting through the Southern Ocean after months stuck spinning on the same spot, scientists from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) have said.
The sea is contained within the two overlapping Antarctic territorial claims of Argentine Antarctica, the British Antarctic Territory, and also resides partially within the Antarctic Chilean Territory. At its widest the sea is around 2,000 kilometres (1,200 mi) across, and its area is around 2.8 million square kilometres (1.1 × 10 ^ 6 sq mi). [1]
Antarctica provides the water hemisphere with the majority of Earth's ice. Most of the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean, and the whole Southern Ocean, are in the water hemisphere. The water hemisphere is approximately 89 percent water (almost all pertaining to the World Ocean), 6 percent dry land and 5 percent polar ice cap. [1]