North Sea - beauty and inaccessibility

The Arctic Ocean is considered to be the smallest and coldest water body on the planet Earth, not without reason in Ancient Russia it was called the "Student Sea".

The seas that form part of the Arctic Ocean basin, namely: Kara, White, East Siberian, Barents, Laptev, Chukchi - began to be called "northern". All of the above natural objects, with the exception of the White Sea, are marginal, separated from each other by a chain of islands, including the Northern Earth, Novaya Zemlya, Franz Josef Land and others. All the northern seas are considered shallow, because they are on the shelf of the continent. Only the northern territory of the Laptev Sea is located on the outskirts of the deep-water basin, called Nansen. The bottom of the sea at this point decreases to 3385 meters, as a result of its average depth is 533 meters, so this natural object, once discovered by the Laptev brothers, is considered the deepest of the northern seas. The second position in the degree of deepwater is occupied by the Barents Sea, the average parameter of the above parameter is 222 meters, and the maximum is 600 meters. The shallowest natural objects are the Chukchi Sea, its average depth is 71 meters, and the East Siberian Sea is 54 meters.

Noteworthy is the fact that the ice in these seas holds for all 12 months. A significant area of the Arctic Ocean is "enveloped" by ice all year round.

The incredible cold that "exhale" the northern seas, the ice cover and the polar night prevent the normal development of zooplankton and phytoplankton, as a result of which the level of biological productivity is low. The wealth and species "arsenal" of organisms living here are not distinguished. In harsh conditions, the most resistant to low temperatures survive.

At the same time, the fish of the northern seas are distinguished by abundance and variety of species: sea bass, halibut, haddock, herring, salmon, nelma. Among commercial fish, muxun, vendace, omul, as well as representatives of the family of smeltfish are of special value.

But there is a water object, which is not only conventionally called "northern", but also has a similar official name. If you go around the Scandinavian peninsula from the north to the south, you will certainly find yourself in the North Sea, which is the only water body in the Atlantic that connects with European countries. Some call it the "German" sea.

The water area of the North Sea covers 544,000 square kilometers. Its depth averages 96 m, but in some places, for example in the Norwegian Trench, it reaches 809 m. The North Sea is washed by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the coast of the Orkney and Shetland Islands, and the coasts of Europe. Waterways connect it with the Norwegian and Baltic seas, the ocean. The North Sea washes the territory of Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, France.

Large European rivers flow into it : Elbe, Rhine, Thames, Scheldt, Weser.

The vegetative world of the sea has about three hundred species of plants. This is phytoplankton, sea grass, red, brown, green algae. Favorable temperature promotes their rapid growth.

Fauna is represented by one and a half thousand species of animals: mollusks, coelenterates, fish. There are also mammals, among which are beluga whales, dolphins, killer whales, whales.

The richness of the sea depths became the basis of industrial fishing in all countries emerging to the North Sea. It produces herring, flounder, mackerel, sprats and other fish. In the North Sea, you can find different types of sharks: Atlantic, cat, catran, hammerhead, blue, polar.

The shore line is diverse in its relief. In the Watt Sea area, this is a plain, sometimes descending to sea level. Near Norway and in the south-east - an island line. In Scandinavia, the beaches are cut by fjords, many bays.

The bottom of the sea is basically a plain, gradually deepening with distance from the coast. In the bottom relief there are shoals (Gudmin-Sand, Dogger), located off the coast of Great Britain. On the south pass ridges of sand and gravel, washed by tides. One of the deepest places is the Norwegian Trench, the depression has an average depth of 350 m. The bottom bottom consists mainly of mud and sand.

The North Sea does not freeze, because from the Norwegian Sea it includes a warm North Atlantic current. Water warms up to twenty degrees in the summer, and in winter it does not get colder than two degrees of heat.

The flow of sea water has a cyclone direction (against the clockwise direction), its speed is small: about half a meter per second. The current is influenced by winds, mostly western, which create a temperate climate in the region of the sea. There are frequent storms and fogs, which makes navigation difficult. The height of the tides in the UK reaches seven meters, in Scandinavia - one meter.

The bottom of the sea is replete with natural resources - oil and gas. Their development is conducted off the coast of Norway and Scotland.