Burnett Bay is a

Canadian Arctic Northern Canada, colloquially the North or the Territories, is the vast northernmost region of Canada variously defined by geography and politics. Politically, the term refers to the three territories of Canada: Yukon, Northwest Territories and N ...

waterway A waterway is any navigable body of water. Broad distinctions are useful to avoid ambiguity, and disambiguation will be of varying importance depending on the nuance of the equivalent word in other languages. A first distinction is necessary b ...

in the

Northwest Territories The Northwest Territories (abbreviated ''NT'' or ''NWT''; french: Territoires du Nord-Ouest, formerly ''North-Western Territory'' and ''North-West Territories'' and namely shortened as ''Northwest Territory'') is a federal territory of Canada. ...

. It is an eastern arm of the

Arctic Ocean The Arctic Ocean is the smallest and shallowest of the world's five major oceans. It spans an area of approximately and is known as the coldest of all the oceans. The International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) recognizes it as an ocean, a ...

Beaufort Sea The Beaufort Sea (; french: Mer de Beaufort, Iñupiaq: ''Taġiuq'') is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean, located north of the Northwest Territories, the Yukon, and Alaska, and west of Canada's Arctic islands. The sea is named after Sir Fr ...

on northwestern

Banks Island Banks Island is one of the larger members of the Arctic Archipelago. Situated in the Inuvik Region, and part of the Inuvialuit Settlement Region, of the Northwest Territories, it is separated from Victoria Island to its east by the Prince of ...

. Robillard Island, Norway Island, and Bernard Island lie in a semicircle outside the bay's mouth. The bay was named for

William Burnett Sir William Burnett, KCB, FRS (16 January 1779 – 16 February 1861) was a British physician who served as Physician-General of the Royal Navy. Early life Burnett was born in Montrose, Scotland on 16 January 1779 and attended Montrose Gramm ...

, Director-General of the Medical Department of the Navy, by

Robert McClure Vice-Admiral Sir Robert John Le Mesurier McClure (28 January 1807 – 17 October 1873) was an Irish explorer of Scots descent who explored the Arctic. In 1854 he traversed the Northwest Passage by boat and sledge, and was the first to ci ...

during the

McClure Arctic Expedition The McClure Arctic expedition of 1850, among numerous British search efforts to determine the fate of the Franklin's lost expedition, is distinguished as the voyage during which the Irish explorer Robert McClure became the first person to confirm ...

.Gazetteer of the Northwest Territories

References

Bays of the Northwest Territories Bays of the Arctic Ocean {{NorthwestTerritories-geo-stub