The Danish Strait: description, photo. Waterfall at the bottom of the Danish Strait

Where is the Danish Strait? It divides the southeast coast of the island of Greenland and the northwestern coast of the state of Iceland. It is located in the northern hemisphere, its maximum width reaches 280 kilometers. It connects the Greenland Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. It has a minimum depth of navigable part of 230 meters. The length of the water area is about 500 kilometers. The Danish Strait conventionally divides the World Ocean into the Arctic and Atlantic. According to the research of geographers, the true straits were formed about 15 thousand years ago.

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Battles of the Second World War took place in the Danish Channel. One of the most famous ones that happened in May 1941, it was attended by the British Royal Navy ships and the naval forces of the Third Reich (Kingsmaire). The liner cruiser of the British fleet Hood, as a result of these actions, was damaged and sunk by the heavy cruiser Prince Eugen and the battleship Bismarck, by which the British, led by the Prince of Wales battleship, tried to prevent the passage through the Danish strait into the Atlantic Ocean. Commanded the forces of the Third Reich Gunther Lutyens, and the British - Lancelot Holland, who died along with the rest of the team.

Development of the water area

The first people to visit the strait were Vikings from Norway, who in the 9th century sailed on their ships to the shores of North America and Greenland. Due to the peculiarities of the climate, the icebergs are constantly drifting along the waters of the water area.

The coasts of the islands of Greenland and Iceland, which is washed by the Danish strait, are cut by fjords and, by and large, did not externally change over the past several millennia.

Bottom and depth

It should be noted that the relief of the bottom in the strait is rather uneven. The threshold between Iceland and Greenland has depressions, the depth of which reaches more than 300 m, and the minimum - about 150 m. It separates the strait from the North Atlantic. It is believed that the average depth of the strait varies between 200-300 m. However, after long studies of this water area, scientists have discovered deep enough depressions, the size of which exceeds two thousand meters. That is why it can be argued that the change in the depth of the Danish Strait ranges from 150 to 2.9 thousand meters.

Shipping

The impact of human activities on these edges is poor. Shipping in the Danish Strait is not intensive. Among the categories of vessels, fishing predominates, as this area is rich in arthropods, many fish species, for example, salmon, capelin, flounder, halibut. The Danish Strait is considered an industrial fishing zone.

Shipping is still difficult due to the fact that from the final parts of the fjords of the island of Greenland, there is a regular separation of icebergs, drifting later in the direction of the currents. Some of them are particularly large and represent a considerable danger to the courts. Often, along with fishing ships with research to the straits are sent climatologists, hydrologists and meteorologists.

Underwater animal world

The fauna of the water area is rich in marine representatives. As we said before, there are many commercial fishes here. This is capelin, species of the family of salmonids, etc. Among other representatives of the animal world, the Danish strait is inhabited by various species of whales, such as killer whales and whale-beluga whales. On the coast of Greenland, seagulls and harp seals are organized .

Strait Features

There are two important currents in this water area. One of them is warm - Irminger, the second cold - East Greenland. They, in the main, influence the climate formation, both in the strait itself and in the nearby regions, that is, the islands. Scientists are making a lot of effort to study the data of the circulating masses. Why are they showing so much attention? Everything is extremely simple, these currents, or rather, their interaction, largely determines the climate of Northern Europe.

In order to understand the importance of this, it is necessary to answer a number of questions. For example, why has the temperature of the Danish Strait been continuously declining over the past decades? Is it possible to predict climate change in the short term? It is not yet clear whether the warming or cooling of the climate in Northern Europe will come, but the study of the strait will allow us to make forecasts both for the long term and for a shorter period.

Waterfall in the Danish Strait

Among the "attractions" of the Danish Strait, you can note the underwater waterfall. It is the largest in the world. This "miracle" of nature in height is more than 4 times greater than the largest aboveground waterfall. However, this is not the only thing in which it surpasses the rest. The amount of water falling to its base per unit time exceeds the indicators of the largest waterfalls over the water hundreds of times. The rock that rises from the bottom of the strait reaches a height of three thousand meters. It is from it down streams of water of the Arctic Ocean.

The waterfall at the bottom of the Danish strait due to its geographical position, cold waters and the depth on which it is located has been little studied, but nevertheless attracts the attention of specialists from different countries. The first thing that deserves attention is the ways of forming such unique phenomena. Underwater waterfalls arise due to the fact that the degree of salinity and the temperature level in different parts of the ocean is different, and there are nearby underwater slopes, then according to the laws of physics less dense water is displaced more dense from the ocean floor. Of course, nobody saw this waterfall because of the impossibility of immersion.