Bering Sea

Pacific Ocean - Bering Sea

The Bering Sea, also known as the Imarpik Sea, is a body of water which is located in the extreme north of the Pacific Ocean. It is separated from the main body of the Pacific by the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands. It covers over two million square kilometres (775,000 sq. miles) and is bordered on the east and northeast by Alaska, on the west by Russia's Siberia and Kamchatka Peninsula, on the south by the Alaska Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands and on the far north by the Bering Strait which separates the Bering Sea from the Arctic Ocean's Chukchi Sea.

It was named after Danish navigator Vitus Bering for being the first European discoverer to sail its waters.

During the most recent ice age, the Bering Sea was a vast grassland that served as the gateway for people migrating from Asia to North America. The sea level was thought to be low enough to allow humans and other animals to migrate on foot across what is now the Bering Strait, located on the northern side of the sea. This is commonly referred to as the "Bering land bridge" and is believed by some scholars (in dispute by others) to be the first entry of humans into the Americas.

The Bering Sea is one of the world's richest fisheries, and the Alaskan waters serves half the U.S. catch of fish and shellfish. Because of changes happening in the Arctic, future evolution of the Bering Sea climate and ecosystem is more uncertain. This is a symmetric problem as climate change impacts ecosystems and ecosystems serve as indicators for climate change.

There is a small portion of the Kula Plate in the Bering Sea. The Kula Plate is an ancient oceanic plate, which began subducting (where two tectonic plates meet and move towards one another, with one sliding underneath the other) under Alaska as Pangaea broke apart during the Jurassic period.

Islands in the Bering Sea include:

Pribilof Islands - a group of four volcanic islands, part of Alaska, lying in the Bering Sea, about 200 miles north of Unalaska and 200 miles south of Cape Newenham, the nearest point on the North American mainland. The Siberian coast is roughly 500 miles away. About 200 square kilometres in total area, they are mostly rocky, covered with meadow and tundra (an area where the tree growth is hindered by low temperatures and short growing seasons). It supports a human population of 684.

Komandorski Islands which includes the Bering Island - these are a group of treeless Russian islands located 175 km east of the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Russian Far East, in the Bering Sea. The islands consist of Bering Island (95 km by 15 km), Medny Island (55 km by 5 km), and fifteen smaller ones, the largest of which are Kamen Toporkov (Puffin Rock) and Ariy Island.

St. Lawrence Island - this island is located west of mainland Alaska in the Bering Sea, just south of the Bering Strait, at about 64° North 170° 28' West. It is part of Alaska, but closer to Russia than to the Alaskan mainland.

Diomede Islands - also known as Gvozdev Islands in Russia, consist of the western island Big Diomede, also known as Imaqliq, Nunarbuk or Ratmanov Island, and the eastern island Little Diomede, also known as Krusenstern Island or Inaliq. These are two rocky islands located in the middle of the Bering Strait between Alaska and Russia.

King Island - this island is about 1.6km (1 mile) wide. It was once the winter home of a group of about 200 Inupiat who called themselves Aseuluk.

St. Matthew Island - this island is an uninhabited island in the Bering Sea in Alaska, 295km (183 miles) WNW of Nunivak Island. The island is 357.049 km² (137.857 sq miles) in land area. Its most southerly point is Cape Upright which features cliff faces which exceed 1000 feet. There is a small island to the north called Hall Island. The highest point on the island is 450 metres above sea level. The entire island's natural scenery and wildlife is protected as it is part of the Bering Sea unit of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge.

Karaginsky Island - this is an island of Russia in the Karaginsky Gulf of the Bering Sea near the eastern shores of Kamchatka. It is part of Koryak Autonomous Okrug The area of the island is 2,000 km². The highest peak of the island is 912 metres. Karaginsky Island is covered with tundra vegetation and cedar underwood. Karaginsky Island is a Ramsar site (The Ramsar Convention is an international treaty for the conservation and sustainable utilization of wetlands).

Back to Seas