21 Facts About North Atlantic Ocean

North Atlantic Ocean has irregular coasts indented by numerous bays, gulfs and seas.

Bathymetry of the North Atlantic Ocean is dominated by a submarine mountain range called the Mid-North Atlantic Ocean Ridge .

Continental shelves in the Atlantic are wide off Newfoundland, southernmost South America, and north-eastern Europe.

The south tides in the Atlantic Ocean are semi-diurnal; that is, two high tides occur every 24 lunar hours.

The Atlantic Subarctic Upper Water in the northernmost North Atlantic is the source for Subarctic Intermediate Water and North Atlantic Intermediate Water.

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The wide range of salinities in the North Atlantic is caused by the asymmetry of the northern subtropical gyre and the large number of contributions from a wide range of sources: Labrador Sea, Norwegian-Greenland Sea, Mediterranean, and South Atlantic Intermediate Water.

South North Atlantic Ocean is dominated by the anti-cyclonic southern subtropical gyre.

The Gulf Stream helps moderate winter temperatures along the coastline of southeastern North Atlantic Ocean America, keeping it warmer in winter along the coast than inland areas.

Atlantic Ocean is underlain mostly by dense mafic oceanic crust made up of basalt and gabbro and overlain by fine clay, silt and siliceous ooze on the abyssal plain.

Opening of the Atlantic Ocean coincided with the initial break-up of the supercontinent Pangaea, both of which were initiated by the eruption of the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province, one of the most extensive and voluminous large igneous provinces in Earth's history associated with the Triassic–Jurassic extinction event, one of Earth's major extinction events.

Geologically, the Northern Atlantic is the area delimited to the south by two conjugate margins, Newfoundland and Iberia, and to the north by the Arctic Eurasian Basin.

The opening of the Northern Atlantic closely followed the margins of its predecessor, the Iapetus Ocean, and spread from the Central Atlantic in six stages: Iberia–Newfoundland, Porcupine–North America, Eurasia–Greenland, Eurasia–North America.

The opening of the North Atlantic caused significant uplift of continental crust along the coast.

North Atlantic Ocean contains about 810 seamounts, most of them situated along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

Geologically the South Atlantic can be divided into four segments: Equatorial segment, from 10°N to the Romanche Fracture Zone ; Central segment, from RFZ to Florianopolis Fracture Zone ; Southern segment, from FFZ to the Agulhas-Falkland Fracture Zone ; and Falkland segment, south of AFFZ.

Meanwhile, the Scotia Arc and Caribbean Plate in the western Atlantic Basin are eastward-propagating subduction systems that might, together with the Gibraltar system, represent the beginning of the closure of the Atlantic Ocean and the final stage of the Atlantic Wilson cycle.

Early settlements across the Atlantic have been suggested by alternative theories, ranging from purely hypothetical to mostly disputed, including the Solutrean hypothesis and some of the Pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact theories.

From Columbus to the Industrial Revolution Trans-North Atlantic Ocean trade, including colonialism and slavery, became crucial for Western Europe.

Atlantic Ocean became the scene of one of the longest continuous naval military camapaigns throughout World War II, from 1939 to 1945.

North Atlantic Ocean has contributed significantly to the development and economy of surrounding countries.

Besides major transatlantic transportation and communication routes, the North Atlantic Ocean offers abundant petroleum deposits in the sedimentary rocks of the continental shelves.