Pacific Ocean is the largest body of water on earth

The Pacific Ocean

The Pacific Ocean is the largest body of water on earth. It is twice the size of the Atlantic Ocean, four times the size of the Indian Ocean, and more than ten times larger than the Arctic Ocean or the Antarctic Ocean. Its length from north to south measures nearly 8,000 miles, and along the Equator where it is widest the ocean measures more than 9,000 miles. When marked out on a map, it is seen that the Pacific Ocean occupies more space than all the continents combined and covers more than one third of the entire surface of the earth.

Borders of the Pacific

The Pacific is bounded in part by land and in part by water. On the east and northeast it is walled in by land extending from Cape Horn along South America, Central America, Mexico, the United States mainland, Canada, and Alaska, a distance equal to nearly one third of the circumference of the earth. Until the Panama Canal was dug and opened for navigation in 1914, this wall was unbroken and the Pacific was entirely shut off from the Atlantic. On the north the Pacific is connected with the Arctic Ocean by Bering Strait -only 54 miles wide. On the northwest the Pacific is bounded by the continent of Asia, which is bordered by the long chain of islands known as the Kuriles, Kamchatka, Japan, and Taiwan. On the west the waters of the Pacific join the waters of the Indian Ocean by passing through straits between the Philippines, Borneo, Celebes, Sumatra, Java, and Australia. On the south the Pacific Ocean is united with the Antarctic Ocean by two great branches; one of them, that between Australia and New Zealand, is 1,200 miles wide, and the other, that between New Zealand and South America, 5,000 miles wide.

Depths of the Pacific

The Pacific Ocean is not only very broad but also very deep. Its waters rest in an enormous basin with steep sides and a wrinkled bottom. In several places the water covering the bottom of the basin is 25,000 feet deep, and at one place near Mindanao, one of the Philippine Islands, it is 32,088 feet deep. The average depth of the whole Pacific is nearly 14,000 feet, which means that, if placed almost anywhere on the bottom of the ocean, the great mountain Mauna Kea, 13,823 feet in height, would be entirely covered with water. Only near the continental shores of America, Asia, and Australia and near islands is the depth of the Pacific less than 1,000 feet.

From this deeply sunken floor of the Pacific masses of land project upward. Many of them do not reach the surface of the water; some of them, called reefs, come just about to the surface and may be covered by water during high tide and exposed to view at low tide; others remain above the surface as islands.