Compare Bassas da India (2005) - Arctic Ocean (2002)

Compare Bassas da India (2005) z Arctic Ocean (2002)

	Bassas da India (2005)	Arctic Ocean (2002)

Area	total: 0.2 sq km land: 0.2 sq km water: 0 sq km	total: 14.056 million sq km note: includes Baffin Bay, Barents Sea, Beaufort Sea, Chukchi Sea, East Siberian Sea, Greenland Sea, Hudson Bay, Hudson Strait, Kara Sea, Laptev Sea, Northwest Passage, and other tributary water bodies
Area - comparative	about one-third the size of The Mall in Washington, DC	slightly less than 1.5 times the size of the US
Background	This atoll is a volcanic rock surrounded by reefs and is awash at high tide. A French possession since 1897, it was placed under the administration of a commissioner residing in Reunion in 1968.	The Arctic Ocean is the smallest of the world's five oceans (after the Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean, and the recently delimited Southern Ocean). The Northwest Passage (US and Canada) and Northern Sea Route (Norway and Russia) are two important seasonal waterways. A sparse network of air, ocean, river, and land routes circumscribes the Arctic Ocean.
Climate	tropical	polar climate characterized by persistent cold and relatively narrow annual temperature ranges; winters characterized by continuous darkness, cold and stable weather conditions, and clear skies; summers characterized by continuous daylight, damp and foggy weather, and weak cyclones with rain or snow
Coastline	35.2 km	45,389 km
Country name	conventional long form: none conventional short form: Bassas da India	-
Dependency status	possession of France; administered by the Administrateur Superieur of the French Southern and Antarctic Lands	-
Disputes - international	claimed by Madagascar	some maritime disputes (see littoral states); Russia is the first state to submit data to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf to extend its continental shelf by claiming two undersea ridges in the Arctic Ocean
Economy - overview	no economic activity	Economic activity is limited to the exploitation of natural resources, including petroleum, natural gas, fish, and seals.
Elevation extremes	lowest point: Indian Ocean 0 m highest point: unnamed location 2.4 m	lowest point: Fram Basin -4,665 m highest point: sea level 0 m
Environment - current issues	NA	endangered marine species include walruses and whales; fragile ecosystem slow to change and slow to recover from disruptions or damage; thinning polar icepack
Flag description	the flag of France is used	-
Geographic coordinates	21 30 S, 39 50 E	90 00 N, 0 00 E
Geography - note	the islands emerge from a circular reef that sits atop a long-extinct, submerged volcano	major chokepoint is the southern Chukchi Sea (northern access to the Pacific Ocean via the Bering Strait); strategic location between North America and Russia; shortest marine link between the extremes of eastern and western Russia; floating research stations operated by the US and Russia; maximum snow cover in March or April about 20 to 50 centimeters over the frozen ocean; snow cover lasts about 10 months
Irrigated land	0 sq km (1998 est.)	-
Land boundaries	0 km	-
Land use	arable land: 0% permanent crops: 0% other: 100% (all rock) (2001)	-
Legal system	the laws of France, where applicable, apply	-
Location	Southern Africa, islands in the southern Mozambique Channel, about one-half of the way from Madagascar to Mozambique	body of water between Europe, Asia, and North America, mostly north of the Arctic Circle
Map references	Africa	Arctic Region
Maritime claims	territorial sea: 12 nm exclusive economic zone: 200 nm	-
Military - note	defense is the responsibility of France	-
Natural hazards	maritime hazard since it is usually under water during high tide and surrounded by reefs; subject to periodic cyclones	ice islands occasionally break away from northern Ellesmere Island; icebergs calved from glaciers in western Greenland and extreme northeastern Canada; permafrost in islands; virtually ice locked from October to June; ships subject to superstructure icing from October to May
Natural resources	none	sand and gravel aggregates, placer deposits, polymetallic nodules, oil and gas fields, fish, marine mammals (seals and whales)
Population	uninhabited (July 2005 est.)	-
Ports and harbors	none; offshore anchorage only	Churchill (Canada), Murmansk (Russia), Prudhoe Bay (US)
Terrain	volcanic rock	central surface covered by a perennial drifting polar icepack that averages about 3 meters in thickness, although pressure ridges may be three times that size; clockwise drift pattern in the Beaufort Gyral Stream, but nearly straight-line movement from the New Siberian Islands (Russia) to Denmark Strait (between Greenland and Iceland); the icepack is surrounded by open seas during the summer, but more than doubles in size during the winter and extends to the encircling landmasses; the ocean floor is about 50% continental shelf (highest percentage of any ocean) with the remainder a central basin interrupted by three submarine ridges (Alpha Cordillera, Nansen Cordillera, and Lomonosov Ridge)
Transportation - note	-	sparse network of air, ocean, river, and land routes; the Northwest Passage (North America) and Northern Sea Route (Eurasia) are important seasonal waterways

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