The southernmost continent is what it is?

For residents of our latitudes is characteristic that the word "southern" is associated with something hot or at least warm. But, as it turned out, the southernmost continent has nothing to do with hot sunny beaches and girls dressed in bikinis. In the south of the planet, as in its north, there is an abode of ice, snow and cold. Have you guessed what the southernmost continent is?

For some reason, mankind has always been sure that somewhere in the south there is a land

At a time when the sphericity of the planet was already recognized and for that they ceased to burn at the stake, even ancient scientists made a thought (and many of them were absolutely sure of it) that somewhere along the planet there is a certain Southern continent. Since the 16th century, numerous attempts have been made to find this very continent. In pursuit of the championship, a large number of other islands and places were opened, which were immediately put on the map and began to be colonized or privatized. So, let's say, the Philippines, Solomon Islands, New Guinea were opened .

When did Antarctica allow the human leg to step on it?

But the southernmost continent was discovered only three hundred years after the beginning of the search - in 1820. The expedition was very cold. Instead of the mountains of gold, which for some reason expected to find in the south of the planet, people were confronted with a huge number of silent desert ice, some diluted by penguins.

And again people in their repertoire

Since then, on the basis of dividing new lands, conflicts arose, several of them - even with the use of weapons; There were races on the study and conquest of cold lands. Many people died or experienced during the expeditions very terrible tests related to frostbite and hunger.

All this led to the fact that in 1959 the Antarctic Treaty was signed: all actions to divide the territories were stopped, Antarctica became the mainland of science. There is no production of any resources - only scientific research and study related to the climate of the planet and the cosmos.

What kind of weather meets its researchers every year?

What is the southernmost continent by the nature of its weather? For the southern polar circle, conditions are such that day and night last six months, the angle of reflection of the sun's rays is such that the heat does not stay on the surface, the temperature characteristic of the continent lies within the limits from minus 70 degrees Celsius in winter to minus 25 in the summer.

South America is not the southernmost, but the wettest

Before the discovery of Antarctica, the title "The southernmost continent" rightfully belonged to South America. The distance between its extreme point and the nearest point of Antarctica is only 1,000 km. This title was taken away from America, but honored another: South America is the wettest continent of the Earth. This is due not only to the amount of precipitation that is characteristic of the climate of the continent, but also to the waters of rivers that have cut almost the entire territory of South America. The basin of the largest rivers (Orinoco, Parana and Amazon) is approximately 10 million square kilometers, when the area of the whole South America is 17 million square kilometers.

And who is there on the other pole?

Sadly, the southernmost continent does not have a brother - the northern mainland. Everyone knows that at the North Pole there is only the Arctic Ocean - endless desert ice, which periodically trails the icebreakers of expeditions.

What is considered the extreme northern land, if the continent is not on the second pole?

The extreme northern point, which refers to any continent, is Cape Morris-Jessep, which is located on the island of Greenland, North America. Its coordinates are 83 degrees 39 minutes north latitude. It is only 708 kilometers to the point of the North Pole. So, when answering the question about what is the most northern and southernmost continent, you can say that it is Antarctica and North America. Only with a few explanations - that Antarctica is a continent that lies entirely beyond the southern polar circle, and its center practically coincides with the point of the South Pole. And North America only has the northernmost point of land. It itself is located from the equator to the northern latitudes.