llowed by the Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean, Southern Ocean, and Arctic
Ocean). Strategically important access waterways include the La Perouse,
Tsugaru, Tsushima, Taiwan, Singapore, and Torres Straits.

Geography Pacific Ocean

Location: body of water between the Southern Ocean, Asia, Australia,
and the Western Hemisphere

Geographic coordinates: 0 00 N, 160 00 W

Map references: Political Map of the World

Area: total: 155.557 million sq km note: includes Bali Sea, Bering Sea,
Bering Strait, Coral Sea, East China Sea, Flores Sea, Gulf of Alaska,
Gulf of Tonkin, Java Sea, Philippine Sea, Savu Sea, Sea of Japan, Sea
of Okhotsk, South China Sea, Tasman Sea, Timor Sea, and other tributary
water bodies

Area - comparative: about 15 times the size of the US; covers about 28%
of the global surface; larger than the total land area of the world

Coastline: 135,663 km

Climate: planetary air pressure systems and resultant wind patterns
exhibit remarkable uniformity in the south and east; trade winds
and westerly winds are well-developed patterns, modified by seasonal
fluctuations; tropical cyclones (hurricanes) may form south of Mexico
from June to October and affect Mexico and Central America; continental
influences cause climatic uniformity to be much less pronounced in the
eastern and western regions at the same latitude in the North Pacific
Ocean; the western Pacific is monsoonal - a rainy season occurs during
the summer months, when moisture-laden winds blow from the ocean over
the land, and a dry season during the winter months, when dry winds blow
from the Asian landmass back to the ocean; tropical cyclones (typhoons)
may strike southeast and east Asia from May to December

Terrain: surface currents in the northern Pacific are dominated by a
clockwise, warm-water gyre (broad circular system of currents) and in the
southern Pacific by a counterclockwise, cool-water gyre; in the northern
Pacific, sea ice forms in the Bering Sea and Sea of Okhotsk in winter;
in the southern Pacific, sea ice from Antarctica reaches its northernmost
extent in October; the ocean floor in the eastern Pacific is dominated
by the East Pacific Rise, while the western Pacific is dissected by deep
trenches, including the Mariana Trench, which is the world's deepest

Elevation extremes: lowest point: Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench
-10,924 m highest point: sea level 0 m

Natural resources: oil and gas fields, polymetallic