Terra Nova Bay is a bay which is often ice free, about long, lying between

Cape Washington Cape Washington is a prominent cape, , marking the south extremity of the cove which separates Wood Bay and Terra Nova Bay, in Victoria Land, Antarctica. It separates the Borchgrevink Coast to the north from the Scott Coast to the south. It was ...

and the

Drygalski Ice Tongue The Drygalski Ice Tongue, Drygalski Barrier, or Drygalski Glacier Tongue is a glacier in Antarctica, on the Scott Coast, in the northern McMurdo Sound of Ross Dependency, north of Ross Island. The Drygalski Ice Tongue is stable by the standar ...

along the coast of

Victoria Land Victoria Land is a region in eastern Antarctica which fronts the western side of the Ross Sea and the Ross Ice Shelf, extending southward from about 70°30'S to 78°00'S, and westward from the Ross Sea to the edge of the Antarctic Plateau. It ...

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest contine ...

. It was discovered by the

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

National Antarctic Expedition (known as the ''Discovery'' Expedition) under

Robert Falcon Scott Captain Robert Falcon Scott, , (6 June 1868 – c. 29 March 1912) was a British Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the ''Discovery'' expedition of 1901–1904 and the ill-fated ''Terra Nov ...

, 1901–1904, and named by him after '' Terra Nova'', one of the relief ships for the expedition. The Italian permanent

Zucchelli Station Zucchelli Station is an Italian seasonal research station, located at Terra Nova Bay in Antarctica on a granitic headland along the coast of the Northern Foothills to north-east of Gerlache Inlet. It has been named after Mario Zucchelli, direct ...

is located in the bay, as is the

Jang Bogo Station The Jang Bogo Station in Terra Nova Bay, Antarctica is a permanent South Korean research station. It is the second base of South Korean Antarctic research mission (after King Sejong Station), and the first that is located in mainland Antarctica. ...

of South Korea.

Relief Inlet Relief Inlet () is a narrow inlet at the southwest corner of Terra Nova Bay. The feature is formed along a shear plane caused by differential ice movement near the coast of Victoria Land involving the north edge of Drygalski Ice Tongue and south ...

can be found in the south west corner of the Bay.

Antarctic Specially Protected Area

A marine area of of the bay comprising a narrow strip of coastal waters about long, to the immediate south of Zucchelli Station, and extending to a maximum of from the shore, has been designated an

Antarctic Specially Protected Area An Antarctic Specially Protected Area (ASPA) is an area on the continent of Antarctica, or on nearby islands, which is protected by scientists and several different international bodies. The protected areas were established in 1961 under the Antarct ...

(ASPA 161). It is an important site for long-term research on the

marine ecology Marine ecosystems are the largest of Earth's aquatic ecosystems and exist in waters that have a high salt content. These systems contrast with freshwater ecosystems, which have a lower salt content. Marine waters cover more than 70% of the surf ...

benthic The benthic zone is the ecological region at the lowest level of a body of water such as an ocean, lake, or stream, including the sediment surface and some sub-surface layers. The name comes from ancient Greek, βένθος (bénthos), meaning "t ...

communities A community is a Level of analysis, social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place (geography), place, Norm (social), norms, religion, values, Convention (norm), customs, or Identity (social science), identity. Communiti ...

. As well as rich and complex

sponge Sponges, the members of the phylum Porifera (; meaning 'pore bearer'), are a basal animal clade as a sister of the diploblasts. They are multicellular organisms that have bodies full of pores and channels allowing water to circulate through t ...

and

anthozoa Anthozoa is a subphylum of marine invertebrates which includes the sea anemones, Scleractinia, stony corals and Alcyonacea, soft corals. Adult anthozoans are almost all attached to the seabed, while their larvae can disperse as part of the plank ...

n communities, the site supports a

colony In modern parlance, a colony is a territory subject to a form of foreign rule. Though dominated by the foreign colonizers, colonies remain separate from the administration of the original country of the colonizers, the ''metropole, metropolit ...

Adélie penguin The Adélie penguin (''Pygoscelis adeliae'') is a species of penguin common along the entire coast of the Antarctic continent, which is the only place where it is found. It is the most widespread penguin species, and, along with the emperor p ...

s at

Adélie Cove Adélie Cove is a 186 ha tract of ice-free land on the coast of Terra Nova Bay in Victoria Land, Antarctica. It has been identified as an Important Bird Area by BirdLife International because it supports populations of seabirds, notably a ...

References

Bays of Victoria Land Scott Coast {{ScottCoast-geo-stub