ATLANTIC OCEAN, a belt of water, roughly of an
-shape, between the western coasts of Europe and Africa and the eastern coasts of North and South America. It extends northward to the Arctic Basin and southward to the Extent. Great Southern Ocean. For purposes of measurement the polar boundaries are taken to be the Arctic and Antarctic circles, although in discussing the configuration and circulation it is impossible to adhere strictly to these limits. The Atlantic Ocean consists of two characteristic divisions, the geographical equator forming a fairly satisfactory line of division into North and South Atlantic. The North Atlantic, by far the best-known of the main divisions of the hydrosphere, is remarkable for the immense length of its coast-line and for the large number of enclosed seas connected with it, including on the western side the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf of St Lawrence and Hudson Bay, and on the eastern side the Mediterranean and Black Sea, the North Sea and the Baltic. The North Atlantic is connected with the Arctic Basin by four main channels: (1) Hudson Strait, about 60 m. wide, communicating with the gulfs and straits of the North American Arctic archipelago; (2) Davis Strait, about 200 m. wide, leading to Baffin Bay; (3) Denmark Strait, between Greenland and Iceland, 130 m. wide; and (4) the “Norwegian Sea,” about 400 m. wide, extending from Iceland to the Faeroe Islands, the Shetland Islands and the coast of Norway. The width of the North Atlantic in lat. 60°, approximately where it breaks up into the branches just named, is nearly 2000 m.; in about lat. 50° N. the coasts of Ireland and Newfoundland approach to 1750 m.; the breadth then increases rapidly to lat. 40° N., and attains its maximum of 4500 m. in lat. 25° N.; farther south the minimum breadth is reached between Africa and South America, Cape Palmas being only 1600 m. distant from Cape St Roque. In marked contrast to this, the South Atlantic is distinguished by great simplicity of coast-line; inland seas there are none, and it attains its greatest breadth as it merges with the Southern Ocean; in lat. 35° S. the width is 3700 m.
The total area of the North Atlantic, not counting inland seas connected with it, is, according to G. Karstens, 36,438,000 sq. kilometres, or 10,588,000 sq. m.; including the inland seas the area is 45,641,000 sq. kilometres or 13,262,000 sq. m. The area of the South Atlantic is 43,455,000 sq. kilometres, or 12,627,000 sq. m. Although not the most extensive of the great oceans, the Atlantic has by far the largest drainage area. The “long slopes” of the continents on both sides are directed towards the Atlantic, which accordingly receives the waters of a large proportion of the great rivers of the world, including the St Lawrence, the Mississippi, the Orinoco, the Amazon, the rivers of the La Plata, the Congo, the Niger, the Loire, the Rhine, the Elbe and the great rivers of the Mediterranean and the Baltic. Sir J. Murray estimates the total area of land draining to the Atlantic to be 13,432,000 sq. m., or with the Arctic area nearly 20,000,000 sq. m., nearly four times the area draining to the Pacific Ocean, and almost precisely four times the area draining to the Indian Ocean. Murray’s calculations give the amount of precipitation received on this area at 15,800 cub. m. annually, and the river discharge from it at 3900 cub. m.
The dominant feature of the relief of the Atlantic basin is a submarine ridge running from north to south from about lat. 50° N. to lat. 40° S., almost exactly in the central line, and following the
-shape of the coasts. Over Relief of the bed. this ridge the average depth is about 1700 fathoms. Towards its northern end the ridge widens and rises to the plateau of the Azores, and in about 50° N. lat. it merges with the “Telegraph Plateau,” which extends across nearly the whole ocean from Ireland to Newfoundland. North of the fiftieth parallel the depths diminish towards the north-east, two long submarine ridges of volcanic origin extend north-eastwards to the south-west of Iceland and to the Faeroe Islands, and these, with their intervening valleys, end in a transverse ridge connecting Greenland, through Iceland and the Faeroe Islands, with North-western Scotland and the continental mass of Europe. The mean depth over this ridge is about 250 fathoms, and the maximum depth nowhere reaches 500 fathoms. The main basin of the Atlantic is thus cut off from the Arctic basin, with which the area north of the ridge has complete deep-water communication. This intermediate region, which has Atlantic characteristics down to 300 fathoms, and at greater depths belongs more properly to the Arctic Sea, commonly receives the name of Norwegian Sea. On both sides of the central ridge deep troughs extend southwards from the Telegraph plateau to the Southern Ocean, the deep water coming close to the land all the way down on both sides. In these troughs the depth is seldom much less than 3000 fathoms, and this is exceeded in a series of patches to which Murray has given the name of “Deeps.” In the eastern trough the Peake Deep lies off the Bay of Biscay in 20° W. long., Monaco Deep and Chun Deep off the north-west of Africa, Moseley Deep off the Cape Verde Islands, Krech Deep off the Liberian coast, and Buchanan Deep off the mouth of the Congo. The western trough extends northwards into Davis Strait, forming a depression in the Telegraph plateau; to the south of Newfoundland and Nova Scotia are Sigsbee Deep, Libbey Deep and Suhm Deep, each of small area; north-east of the Bahamas Nares Deep forms the largest and deepest depression in the Atlantic, in which a sounding of 4561 fathoms was obtained (70 m. north of Porto Rico) by the U.S. ship “Blake” in 1883. Immediately to the south of Nares Deep lies the smaller Makarov Deep; and off the coast of South America are Tizard Deep and Havergal Deep.
Before the Antarctic expeditions of 1903-1904 our knowledge of the form of the sea bottom south of 40° S. lat. was almost wholly derived from the soundings of the expedition of Sir J.C. Ross in the “Erebus” and “Terror” (1839-1843), and the bathymetrical maps published were largely the result of deductions based on one sounding taken by Ross in 68° 34′ S. lat., 12° 49′ W. long., in which he recorded a depth exceeding 4000 fathoms. The Scottish Antarctic expedition has shown this sounding to be erroneous; the “Scotia” obtained samples of bottom, in almost the same spot, from a depth of 2660 fathoms. Combining the results of recent soundings, Dr W.S. Bruce, the leader of the Scottish expedition, finds that there is a ridge “extending in a curve from Madagascar to Bouvet Island, and from Bouvet Island to the Sandwich group, whence there is a forked connexion through the South Orkneys to Graham’s Land, and through South Georgia to the Falkland Islands and the South American continent.” Again, the central ridge of the South Atlantic extends a thousand miles farther south than was supposed, joining the east and west ridge, just described, between the Bouvet Islands and the Sandwich group.
The foundations of our knowledge of the relief of the Atlantic basin may be said to have been laid by the work of H.M.S. “Challenger” (1873-1876), and the German ship “Gazelle” (1874-1876), the French expedition in the “Travailleur” (1880), and the U.S. surveying vessel “Blake” (1877 and later). Large numbers of additional soundings have been made in recent years by cable ships, by the expeditions of H.S.H. the prince of Monaco, the German “Valdivia” expedition under Professor Chun (1898), and the combined Antarctic expeditions (1903-1904).