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The Bohai Sea () is a
marginal sea This is a list of seas of the World Ocean, including marginal seas, areas of water, various gulfs, bights, bays, and straits. Terminology * Ocean – the four to seven largest named bodies of water in the World Ocean, all of which have "Ocean ...
approximately in area on the east coast of
Mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...
. It is the northwestern and innermost extension of the
Yellow Sea The Yellow Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean located between mainland China and the Korean Peninsula, and can be considered the northwestern part of the East China Sea. It is one of four seas named after common colour terms ...
, to which it connects to the east via the Bohai Strait. It has a mean depth of approximately , with a maximum depth of about located in the northern part of the Bohai Strait. The Bohai Sea is enclosed by three
provinces A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman ''provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions outsi ...
and one direct-administered municipality from three different
regions In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as zones, lands or territories, are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of humanity and t ...
of
China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
Liaoning Province Liaoning () is a coastal provinces of China, province in Northeast China that is the smallest, southernmost, and most populous province in the region. With its capital at Shenyang, it is located on the northern shore of the Yellow Sea, and i ...
(of
Northeast China Northeast China or Northeastern China () is a geographical region of China, which is often referred to as "Manchuria" or "Inner Manchuria" by surrounding countries and the West. It usually corresponds specifically to the three provinces east of t ...
),
Hebei Province Hebei or , (; alternately Hopeh) is a northern province of China. Hebei is China's sixth most populous province, with over 75 million people. Shijiazhuang is the capital city. The province is 96% Han Chinese, 3% Manchu, 0.8% Hui, an ...
and
Tianjin Municipality Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popula ...
(of
North China North China, or Huabei () is a List of regions of China, geographical region of China, consisting of the provinces of Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Shanxi and Inner Mongolia. Part of the larger region of Northern China (''Beifang''), it lies north ...
), and
Shandong Province Shandong ( , ; ; alternately romanized as Shantung) is a coastal province of the People's Republic of China and is part of the East China region. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history since the beginning of Chinese civilizatio ...
(of
East China East China () is a geographical and a loosely defined cultural region that covers the eastern coastal area of China. A concept abolished in 1978, for economical purposes the region was defined from 1949 to 1961 by the Chinese Central Governme ...
). The whole of the Bohai Sea is considered a part of both the
internal waters According to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, a nation's internal waters include waters on the side of the baseline of a nation's territorial waters that is facing toward the land, except in archipelagic states. It includes wat ...
of the People's Republic of China and the center of the
Bohai Economic Rim The Bohai Economic Rim (BER) or Bohai Bay Economic Rim (BBER) is the economic region surrounding Tianjin (Tientsin). It also includes areas in Hebei, Liaoning and Shandong surrounding the Bohai Sea. This region has undergone major economic and in ...
. Its proximity to the Chinese capital of Beijing and the
municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...
of
Tianjin Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popul ...
makes it one of the busiest seaways in the world.


History

During the
Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological Epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fina ...
, the Bohai Sea experienced numerous glacioeustatic transgressions and regressions, as evidenced by sediment cores sampled from the seafloor showing fluvial floodplain conditions during intervals of low sea level. Until the early 20th century, Bo Hai was often called the Gulf of Jili or Chihli () or the Gulf of Pechihli or Pechili ().
Chihli Zhili, alternately romanized as Chihli, was a northern administrative region of China since the 14th-century that lasted through the Ming dynasty and Qing dynasty until 1911, when the region was dissolved, converted to a province, and renamed ...
and Pechihli (North Chihli) were historic provinces in an area surrounding Beijing that approximately corresponds to what is now Hebei Province.


Geography

There are three major bays inside the Bohai Gulf:
Laizhou Bay Laizhou Bay () is a bay on the southern shore of the Bohai Sea (also known as the ''Bohai Gulf'', or just ''Bo Hai'', which is a large and relatively shallow westward extension of the northern Yellow Sea), bounded by the northwestern coastline of ...
to the south,
Bohai Bay Bohai Bay () is one of the three major bays of the Bohai Sea, the northwestern and innermost gulf of the Yellow Sea. It is bounded by the coastlines of eastern Hebei province (Tangshan and Cangzhou), Tianjin municipality and northern Shando ...
to the west, and
Liaodong Bay Liaodong Bay () is largest and longest of the three main bays (along with Laizhou Bay to the south and the Bohai Bay to the southwest) of the Bohai Sea, the innermost gulf of the Yellow Sea. Although named after the Liaodong Peninsula (which ...
to the north. The provincial-level administrative divisions that have a coastline to the Bohai Sea are, from the south going clockwise:
Shandong Shandong ( , ; ; alternately romanized as Shantung) is a coastal province of the People's Republic of China and is part of the East China region. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history since the beginning of Chinese civilizati ...
, Hebei,
Tianjin Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popul ...
(Tientsin), Hebei again, and
Liaoning Liaoning () is a coastal province in Northeast China that is the smallest, southernmost, and most populous province in the region. With its capital at Shenyang, it is located on the northern shore of the Yellow Sea, and is the northernmost ...
. Some of the major rivers draining into the gulf include the
Yellow River The Yellow River or Huang He (Chinese: , Standard Beijing Mandarin, Mandarin: ''Huáng hé'' ) is the second-longest river in China, after the Yangtze River, and the List of rivers by length, sixth-longest river system in the world at th ...
,
Xiaoqing River Xiaoqing River () is a river in Shandong Province, China. It is part of the Bohai Sea basin and empties into the Bohai Sea. The river flows through the major cities of Jinan, Zibo, Binzhou, Dongying, and Weifang. It is long and drains a basin. Se ...
,
Hai River The Hai River (海河, lit. "Sea River"), also known as the Peiho, ("White River"), or Hai Ho, is a Chinese river connecting Beijing to Tianjin and the Bohai Sea. The Hai River at Tianjin is formed by the confluence of five watercourses: the S ...
,
Luan River The Luan River (, formerly known as ''Lei Shui'', or ''Ru Shui'') is a river in China. River The river flows northwards from its source in the province of Hebei into the province of Inner Mongolia, and then flows southeast back into Hebei to its m ...
, Dai River,
Daling River The Daling River () is a river in Northeast China. With a length of , it is the main river in the arid western part of Liaoning. Its drainage basin covers , 85% of which is located in Liaoning, 13% in Inner Mongolia and the remaining 2% in Hebei. ...
, Xiaoling River,
Liao River The Liao River () is the principal river in southern Northeast China, and one of the seven main river systems in China. Its name derived from the Liao region, a historical name for southern Manchuria, from which the Liaoning province, Liaodong P ...
and
Daliao River The Daliao River ( zh, s=大辽河, t=大遼河, p=Dàliáohé, "Great Liao River") is a major river system in eastern Liaoning province of Northeast China, and formerly the main distributary of the lower Liao River until 1958. The Daliao River ...
. There are a few important oil reserves in the vicinity of the gulf, including the
Shengli Field The Shengli Oil Field () is the second-largest oil field in the People's Republic of China, with daily production of approximately . It is located in the Yellow River delta, in the north of Shandong province bordering Bohai Sea. Its main working ...
. Important islands or island groups in the gulf include the Changshan Archipelago (), Juehua Island (),
Bijia Mountain Bijia Mountain () is an island located in the Liaodong Bay of China's Bohai Sea, south of the coast of the Jinzhou region of the Liaoning province, coastal China. During most times of the day, Bijiashan can only be accessed by boat. But when the s ...
(), Changxing Island (),
Xizhong Island Xizhong Island () is a major island located in the Bohai Sea, in the province of Liaoning, Northeast China. Xizhong Island is one of a group of islands located at the tip of the Liaodong Peninsula: Changxing Island lies to the north and Fengming ...
(), the East/West Mayi Islands (), Zhu Island () and She Island ().


Bohai Strait

The opening of the Bohai Gulf is bounded by the Changshan Archipelago between
Dalian Dalian () is a major sub-provincial port city in Liaoning province, People's Republic of China, and is Liaoning's second largest city (after the provincial capital Shenyang) and the third-most populous city of Northeast China. Located on the ...
's
Lüshunkou District Lüshunkou District (also Lyushunkou District; ) is a district of Dalian, Liaoning province, China. Also formerly called Lüshun City () or literally Lüshun Port (), it was formerly known as both Port Arthur (russian: Порт-Артур, trans ...
on the southern tip of
Liaodong Peninsula The Liaodong Peninsula (also Liaotung Peninsula, ) is a peninsula in southern Liaoning province in Northeast China, and makes up the southwestern coastal half of the Liaodong region. It is located between the mouths of the Daliao River (the ...
, and the
Cape A cape is a clothing accessory or a sleeveless outer garment which drapes the wearer's back, arms, and chest, and connects at the neck. History Capes were common in medieval Europe, especially when combined with a hood in the chaperon. Th ...
of Penglai on the northernmost protrusion of
Shandong Peninsula The Shandong (Shantung) Peninsula or Jiaodong (Chiaotung) Peninsula is a peninsula in Shandong Province in eastern China, between the Bohai Sea to the north and the Yellow Sea to the south. The latter name refers to the east and Jiaozhou. G ...
. Due to its proximity to the capital city Beijing and the population of its surrounding provinces exceeding 210 million, the exit of the Bohai Gulf to the
Yellow Sea The Yellow Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean located between mainland China and the Korean Peninsula, and can be considered the northwestern part of the East China Sea. It is one of four seas named after common colour terms ...
, the Bohai Strait (), has become one of busiest sea routes in recent times. Due to the Changshan Island Chain traversing the southern half of the strait, the strait is subdivided into several
channel Channel, channels, channeling, etc., may refer to: Geography * Channel (geography), in physical geography, a landform consisting of the outline (banks) of the path of a narrow body of water. Australia * Channel Country, region of outback Austral ...
s: (from north to south, the most commonly used ones in bold) * Laotieshan Channel (), also known as the Lau-ti-shan Channel, is the widest and deepest * Daqin Channel () * Xiaoqin Channel () * North Tuoji Channel () * South Tuoji Channel () * Changshan Channel (), is the most direct route to
Tianjin Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popul ...
* Dengzhou Channel (), also known as the Miaodao Channel () or Miaodao Strait (), is the nearest to the shore but also the shallowest


Major ports

There are five major ports along the Bohai Sea rim, with throughputs over 100 million tons, though the port of Tangshan is further subdivided into Jingtang and Caofeidian: *
Port of Yingkou The Port of Yingkou is an international seaport in Yingkou, Liaoning, People's Republic of China. It is the second-largest port in northeast China and the tenth-largest nationwide. It includes two separate dockland areas, the ''Yingkou old port'' a ...
() *
Qinhuangdao Port Port of Qinhuangdao is a seaport on the Bohai Sea, located in the Haigang District of urban Qinhuangdao, Hebei, People's Republic of China. Together with the Port of Huanghua, Qinhuangdao Port is a major port for coal transportation. Qinhuangdao i ...
() *
Port of Jingtang A port is a maritime law, maritime facility comprising one or more Wharf, wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge Affreightment, cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can a ...
() *
Port of Tangshan The Port of Tangshan () is an artificial deep-water international seaport on the coast of Tangshan Municipality, Hebei, in Northern China. It is the 9th largest port in China and is composed of three separate port areas: Jingtang, Caofeidian an ...
() *
Port of Tangshan The Port of Tangshan () is an artificial deep-water international seaport on the coast of Tangshan Municipality, Hebei, in Northern China. It is the 9th largest port in China and is composed of three separate port areas: Jingtang, Caofeidian an ...
Caofeidian () *
Tianjin Port The Port of Tianjin (''Tianjin Gang'', ), formerly known as the Port of Tanggu, is the largest port in Northern China and the main maritime gateway to Beijing. The name "Tianjin Xingang" (), which strictly speaking refers only to the main seaport ...
() *
Port of Huanghua The Port of Huanghua, also known as the Port of Cangzhou Huanghua is an artificial deep-water international seaport on the coast of Huanghua, Cangzhou Prefecture, Hebei, People's Republic of China. It is located on the south side of the Bohai Bay ...
() Caofeidian and Jingtang are usually treated as one port for statistical purposes. The ports of
Dalian Dalian () is a major sub-provincial port city in Liaoning province, People's Republic of China, and is Liaoning's second largest city (after the provincial capital Shenyang) and the third-most populous city of Northeast China. Located on the ...
and
Yantai Yantai, Postal Map Romanization, formerly romanization of Chinese, known as Chefoo, is a coastal prefecture-level city on the Shandong Peninsula in northeastern Shandong province of People's Republic of China. Lying on the southern coast of ...
are also traditionally considered part of the Bohai rim, even though strictly speaking they lie outside the limits of the sea. The
Port of Longkou The Port of Longkou is an artificial deep-water international seaport on the coast of Longkou, Yantai Prefecture, Shandong, People's Republic of China. It is located on the northern shore of Shandong Peninsula, opening to the Laizhou Bay of the Bo ...
reached 70 million tons of cargo in 2013, and is expected to reach the 100 million ton landmark in the near future.


Major cities along the Bohai Sea coast

*
Liaoning Liaoning () is a coastal province in Northeast China that is the smallest, southernmost, and most populous province in the region. With its capital at Shenyang, it is located on the northern shore of the Yellow Sea, and is the northernmost ...
**
Dalian Dalian () is a major sub-provincial port city in Liaoning province, People's Republic of China, and is Liaoning's second largest city (after the provincial capital Shenyang) and the third-most populous city of Northeast China. Located on the ...
**
Yingkou Yingkou () is a coastal prefecture-level city of central southern Liaoning province, People's Republic of China, on the northeastern shore of Liaodong Bay. It is the third-smallest city in Liaoning with a total area of , and the ninth most populo ...
**
Panjin Panjin () is a coastal prefecture-level city in central Liaoning province, People's Republic of China, situated on the northern shore of the Liaodong Bay. It borders Anshan to the east, Yingkou to the southeast, and Jinzhou to the west and north ...
**
Jinzhou Jinzhou (, ), formerly Chinchow, is a coastal prefecture-level city in central-west Liaoning province, China. It is a geographically strategic city located in the Liaoxi Corridor, which connects most of the land transports between North Chin ...
**
Huludao Huludao (), formerly known as Jinxi () until 1994, is a coastal prefecture-level city in southwestern Liaoning province, People's Republic of China. Its name literally means "Gourd Island", referring to the fiddle-shaped contour of the peninsu ...
*
Hebei Hebei or , (; alternately Hopeh) is a northern province of China. Hebei is China's sixth most populous province, with over 75 million people. Shijiazhuang is the capital city. The province is 96% Han Chinese, 3% Manchu, 0.8% Hui, an ...
**
Qinhuangdao Qinhuangdao (; ) is a port city on the coast of China in northern Hebei. It is administratively a prefecture-level city, about east of Beijing, on the Bohai Sea, the innermost gulf of the Yellow Sea. Its population during the 2020 national ...
**
Tangshan Tangshan () is a coastal, industrial prefecture-level city in the northeast of Hebei province. It is located in the eastern part of Hebei Province and the northeastern part of the North China Plain. It is located in the central area of the Boha ...
**
Cangzhou Cangzhou () is a prefecture-level city in eastern Hebei province, People's Republic of China. At the 2020 census, Cangzhou's built-up (''or metro'') area made of Yunhe, Xinhua districts and Cang County largely being conurbated had a populatio ...
*
Tianjin municipality Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popula ...
*
Shandong Shandong ( , ; ; alternately romanized as Shantung) is a coastal province of the People's Republic of China and is part of the East China region. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history since the beginning of Chinese civilizati ...
**
Yantai Yantai, Postal Map Romanization, formerly romanization of Chinese, known as Chefoo, is a coastal prefecture-level city on the Shandong Peninsula in northeastern Shandong province of People's Republic of China. Lying on the southern coast of ...
**
Weifang Weifang () is a prefecture-level city in central Shandong province, People's Republic of China. The city borders Dongying to the northwest, Zibo to the west, Linyi to the southwest, Rizhao to the south, Qingdao to the east, and looks out to the L ...
**
Dongying Dongying (), a prefecture-level city, lies on the northern (Bohai Sea) coast of Shandong province, People's Republic of China. As of the 2020 census, 2,193,518 people resided within its administrative area of and 1,188,656 in the built-up area ...
**
Binzhou Binzhou (, ), formerly Putai, is a prefecture-level city in northern Shandong Province in the People's Republic of China. The city proper sits on the northern bank of the Yellow River, while its administrative area straddles both sides of its ...


Hydrocarbon resources

The Bohai Bay contains significant oil and gas reserves, which provide much of China's offshore production. The main field in the region, named
Shengli The Shengli Oil Field () is the second-largest oil field in the People's Republic of China, with daily production of approximately . It is located in the Yellow River delta, in the north of Shandong province bordering Bohai Sea. Its main working ...
, has been exploited since the 1960s. It still produces about half a million barrels a day, but is declining.China. Background
US Energy Information Administration
Production is dominated by Chinese majors (
China National Offshore Oil Corporation China National Offshore Oil Corporation, or CNOOC Group (Chinese: 中国海洋石油总公司 Pinyin: ''Zhōngguó Háiyáng Shíyóu Zǒnggōngsī''), is one of the largest national oil companies in China, and the third-largest national oil c ...
was mostly created for this region), but foreign companies, including
ConocoPhillips ConocoPhillips Company is an American multinational corporation engaged in hydrocarbon exploration and production. It is based in the Energy Corridor district of Houston, Texas. The company has operations in 15 countries and has production in ...
and
Roc Oil Company Roc Oil Company Limited was an international petroleum company based in Sydney, Australia. The company was established in 1997 as a privately owned company by John Doran. In 1999, the company went public with an IPO at the Australian Stock Exchang ...
, are present. The Gudao Field, located in the Zhanhua
sedimentary basin Sedimentary basins are region-scale depressions of the Earth's crust where subsidence has occurred and a thick sequence of sediments have accumulated to form a large three-dimensional body of sedimentary rock. They form when long-term subsidence ...
, was discovered in 1968, based on gravity, magnetic and seismic surveys conducted between 1963 and 1964.Sizhong, C., and Ping, W., 1980, Geology of Gudao Oil Field and Surrounding Areas, in Giant Oil and Gas Fields of the Decade: 1968–1978, AAPG Memoir 30, Halbouty, M.T., editor, Tulsa: American Association of Petroleum Geologists, , Pp. 471–486 The reservoir includes the Guantao (
Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and means "less recen ...
) and Minghuazhen (
Pliocene The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58geologic formation A geological formation, or simply formation, is a body of rock having a consistent set of physical characteristics ( lithology) that distinguishes it from adjacent bodies of rock, and which occupies a particular position in the layers of rock exp ...
s within the dome-like
anticline In structural geology, an anticline is a type of fold that is an arch-like shape and has its oldest beds at its core, whereas a syncline is the inverse of an anticline. A typical anticline is convex up in which the hinge or crest is the ...
. The Suizhong 36-1 Oil Field was discovered in 1987, and produces from
Oligocene The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch of the Paleogene Period and extends from about 33.9 million to 23 million years before the present ( to ). As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that define the epoch are well identified but the ...
fluvial In geography and geology, fluvial processes are associated with rivers and streams and the deposits and landforms created by them. When the stream or rivers are associated with glaciers, ice sheets, or ice caps, the term glaciofluvial or fluviog ...
-
deltaic A river delta is a landform shaped like a triangle, created by deposition of sediment that is carried by a river and enters slower-moving or stagnant water. This occurs where a river enters an ocean, sea, estuary, lake, reservoir, or (more rare ...
and lacustrine
sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...
s.Gustavson, J.B., and Gang, X.S., 1992, The Suizhong 36-1 Oil Field, Bohai Gulf, Offshore China, In Giant Oil and Gas Fields of the Decade, 1978–1988, AAPG Memoir 54, Halbouty, M.T., editor, Tulsa: American Association of Petroleum Geologists, Oil spills have been reported frequently in this region: three spills occurred in a two-month timeframe in 2011.


Tunnel crossing

In February 2011,
China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
announced that it would build a road and rail tunnel across the Bohai Strait to connect the Liaodong and Shandong peninsulas. When completed, the tunnel would be long. In July 2013, a modified plan was announced, involving a -long tunnel between
Dalian Dalian () is a major sub-provincial port city in Liaoning province, People's Republic of China, and is Liaoning's second largest city (after the provincial capital Shenyang) and the third-most populous city of Northeast China. Located on the ...
, Liaoning and
Yantai Yantai, Postal Map Romanization, formerly romanization of Chinese, known as Chefoo, is a coastal prefecture-level city on the Shandong Peninsula in northeastern Shandong province of People's Republic of China. Lying on the southern coast of ...
, Shandong. The overall concept had its origins in a 1994 plan, which had been intended for completion by 2010 at a cost of $10 billion.


See also

*
Balhae Balhae ( ko, 발해, zh, c=渤海, p=Bóhǎi, russian: Бохай, translit=Bokhay, ), also rendered as Bohai, was a multi-ethnic kingdom whose land extends to what is today Northeast China, the Korean Peninsula and the Russian Far East. It wa ...
*
Bohai Commandery Bohai Commandery (勃海郡 or 渤海郡) was a commandery of China from Han dynasty to Tang dynasty. It was centered around modern southern Hebei province. The commandery was established during Emperor Gaozu of Han's reign. In Western Han, it ad ...
*
Bohai Economic Rim The Bohai Economic Rim (BER) or Bohai Bay Economic Rim (BBER) is the economic region surrounding Tianjin (Tientsin). It also includes areas in Hebei, Liaoning and Shandong surrounding the Bohai Sea. This region has undergone major economic and in ...


References


External links


Unep Reports – Regional Definition: Bohai Sea
{{Authority control Bays of China Metropolitan areas of China Gulfs of the Pacific Ocean Bodies of water of the Yellow Sea China Seas