Beagle Channel (; Yahgan: ''Onašaga'') is a

strait A strait is an oceanic landform connecting two seas or two other large areas of water. The surface water generally flows at the same elevation on both sides and through the strait in either direction. Most commonly, it is a narrow ocean chan ...

in the Tierra del Fuego Archipelago, on the extreme southern tip of

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sou ...

between

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the eas ...

and

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest ...

. The channel separates the larger main island of Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego from various smaller islands including the islands of

Picton, Lennox and Nueva __NOTOC__ Picton, Lennox and Nueva () form a group of three islands (and their islets) at the extreme southern tip of South America, in the Chilean commune of Cabo de Hornos in Antártica Chilena Province, Magallanes and Antártica Chilena Re ...

;

Navarino Navarino or Navarin may refer to: Battle * Battle of Navarino, 1827 naval battle off Navarino, Greece, now known as Pylos Geography * Navarino, Wisconsin, a town, United States * Navarino (community), Wisconsin, an unincorporated community, Unit ...

; Hoste; Londonderry; and Stewart. The channel's eastern area forms part of the border between Chile and Argentina and the western area is entirely within Chile. The Beagle Channel, the

Straits of Magellan The Strait of Magellan (), also called the Straits of Magellan, is a navigable sea route in southern Chile separating mainland South America to the north and Tierra del Fuego to the south. The strait is considered the most important natural pas ...

to the north, and the open-ocean

Drake Passage The Drake Passage (referred to as Mar de Hoces Hoces Sea"in Spanish-speaking countries) is the body of water between South America's Cape Horn, Chile and the South Shetland Islands of Antarctica. It connects the southwestern part of the Atla ...

to the south are the three navigable passages around South America between the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contine ...

and

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

s. Most commercial shipping uses the open-ocean Drake Passage. The Beagle Channel is about long and wide at its narrowest point. It extends from Nueva Island in the east to Darwin Sound and Cook Bay in the Pacific Ocean in the west. Some from its western end, it divides into two branches, north and south of Gordon Island. The southwest branch between Hoste Island and Gordon Island enters Cook Bay. The northwest branch between Gordon Island and Isla Grande enters Darwin Sound, which connects to the Pacific Ocean by the O'Brien and Ballenero channels. The biggest settlement on the channel is Ushuaia in Argentina followed by Puerto Williams in Chile. These are amongst the southernmost settlements in the world. According to a Selk'nam

myth Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narrat ...

the channel was created alongside the

Strait of Magellan The Strait of Magellan (), also called the Straits of Magellan, is a navigable sea route in southern Chile separating mainland South America to the north and Tierra del Fuego to the south. The strait is considered the most important natural ...

and

Fagnano Lake Fagnano Lake ( es, Lago Fagnano), also called ''Lake Cami'' (), is a lake located on the main island of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago, and shared by Argentina and Chile. The 645 km2 lake runs east–west for about 98 kilometres, of which ...

in places where slingshots fell on earth during Taiyín's fight with a witch who was said to have "retained the waters and the foods".

Navigation

Although it is navigable by large ships, there are safer waters to the south (

) and to the north (

). Under the

Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina The Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina ( es, Tratado de Paz y Amistad de 1984 entre Chile y Argentina, see the text in thUnited Nations was signed into agreement at the Vatican on 29 November 1984. It was ratified ...

, ships of other nations navigate with a Chilean pilot between the

and Ushuaia through the

Magdalena Channel 350px, The channel is visible in the lower left corner. Magdalena Channel () is a Chilean channel joining the Strait of Magellan with the Cockburn Channel and is part of a major navigation route which ultimately connects with the Beagle Channe ...

and the

Cockburn Channel The Cockburn Channel () is a channel that separates the Brecknock Peninsula, which is the westernmost projection of the Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, from Clarence Island, Capitán Aracena Island and other minor islands in Chile. It is located ...

to the Pacific Ocean, then by the Ballenero Channel, the O'Brien Channel and the northwest branch of the Beagle Channel.

Islands

The Beagle Channel is between islands covering a much larger area; to the north lies Argentine-Chilean Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, to the south Hoste,

, and Picton and Nueva, which were claimed by Argentina until 1984. The latter two lie at the bi-national eastern entrance to the channel while the western entrance is wholly inside Chile. The western entrance of Beagle Channel is divided by Gordon Island into two channels. Some minor islands exist inside the channel among them Snipe Islet and

Gable Island Gable Island ( es, Isla Gable) is an Argentine island part of Tierra del Fuego Province. The island is located on the northern side of east–west Beagle Channel less than from Tierra del Fuego Island and about from Chilean Navarino Island. ...

. Except for eastern Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego and Gable Island all islands mentioned here belong to Chile.

History

The Yaghan peoples settled the islands along the Murray Channel approximately 10,000 years before present. There are notable

archaeological Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...

sites indicating such early Yaghan settlement at locations such as

Bahia Wulaia Bahia ( , , ; meaning "bay") is one of the 26 states of Brazil, located in the Northeast Region of the country. It is the fourth-largest Brazilian state by population (after São Paulo, Minas Gerais, and Rio de Janeiro) and the 5th-largest by ...

Isla Navarino Navarino Island () is a Chilean island located between Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, to the north, and Cape Horn, to the south. The island forms part of the Commune of Cabo de Hornos, the southernmost commune in Chile and in the world, belon ...

, site of the ''Bahia Wulaia Dome Middens''.

Naming and Darwin visit

The channel was named after the ship HMS ''Beagle'' during its first

hydrographic survey Hydrographic survey is the science of measurement and description of features which affect maritime navigation, marine construction, dredging, offshore oil exploration/ offshore oil drilling and related activities. Strong emphasis is placed ...

of the coasts of the southern part of South America which lasted from 1826 to 1830. During that expedition, under the overall command of Commander

Phillip Parker King Rear Admiral Phillip Parker King, FRS, RN (13 December 1791 – 26 February 1856) was an early explorer of the Australian and Patagonian coasts. Early life and education King was born on Norfolk Island, to Philip Gidley King and Anna ...

, the ''Beagle'' captain

Pringle Stokes Pringle Stokes (23 April 1793 – 12 August 1828) was a British naval officer who served in HMS '' Owen Glendower'' on a voyage around Cape Horn to the Pacific coast of South America, and on the West African coast fighting the slave trade. He th ...

committed suicide and was replaced by captain

Robert FitzRoy Vice-Admiral Robert FitzRoy (5 July 1805 – 30 April 1865) was an English officer of the Royal Navy and a scientist. He achieved lasting fame as the captain of during Charles Darwin's famous voyage, FitzRoy's second expedition to Tierra de ...

. The ship continued the survey in the second voyage of ''Beagle'' under the command of captain FitzRoy, who took

Charles Darwin Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all species of life have descended ...

along as a self-funding supernumerary, giving him opportunities as an amateur naturalist. Darwin had his first sight of

glacier A glacier (; ) is a persistent body of dense ice that is constantly moving under its own weight. A glacier forms where the accumulation of snow exceeds its ablation over many years, often centuries. It acquires distinguishing features, such a ...

s when they reached the channel on 29 January 1833, and wrote in his field notebook "It is scarcely possible to imagine anything more beautiful than the beryl-like blue of these glaciers, and especially as contrasted with the dead white of the upper expanse of snow."

Beagle conflict

Several small islands (

) up to the

Cape Horn Cape Horn ( es, Cabo de Hornos, ) is the southernmost headland of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago of southern Chile, and is located on the small Hornos Island. Although not the most southerly point of South America (which are the Diego Ramí ...

were the subject of the long-running

Beagle conflict The Beagle conflict was a border dispute between Chile and Argentina over the possession of Picton, Lennox and Nueva islands and the scope of the maritime jurisdiction associated with those islands that brought the countries to the brink of war i ...

between Chile and Argentina; by the terms of a

they are now part of Chile. From the 1950s to 1970s several incidents involving the Chilean and Argentine navies occurred in the waters of the Beagle Channel, for example the 1958 Snipe incident, the 1967 ''Cruz del Sur'' incident and the shelling of ''Quidora'' the same year. See List of incidents during the Beagle conflict.

Beagle Channel in the Fine Arts

* As a ship's painter, Conrad Martens drew and created watercolour paintings in 1833 and 1834 during the second voyage of HMS ''Beagle'' in

Tierra del Fuego Tierra del Fuego (, ; Spanish for "Land of the Fire", rarely also Fireland in English) is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The archipelago consists of the main island, Isla ...

Fauna

Beagle Channel is a prominent area to watch rare, endemic dolphins. Wildlife seen in the channel include the South American sea lion, South American fur seal,

Peale's dolphin Peale's dolphin (''Lagenorhynchus australis'') is a small dolphin found in the waters around Tierra del Fuego at the foot of South America. It is also commonly known as the black-chinned dolphin or even Peale's black-chinned dolphin. However, s ...

dusky dolphin The dusky dolphin (''Lagenorhynchus obscurus'') is a dolphin found in coastal waters in the Southern Hemisphere. Its specific epithet is Latin for "dark" or "dim". It is very closely genetically related to the Pacific white-sided dolphin, b ...

, Commerson's dolphin,

Risso's dolphin Risso's dolphin (''Grampus griseus'') is a dolphin, the only species of the genus ''Grampus''. Some of the closest related species to these dolphins include: pilot whales (''Globicephala'' spp.), pygmy killer whales (''Feresa attenuata''), melon ...

Burmeister's porpoise Burmeister's porpoise (''Phocoena spinipinnis'') is a species of porpoise endemic to the coast of South America. It was first described by Hermann Burmeister, for whom the species is named, in 1865. Locally it is known as ''marsopa espinosa'' ( ...

, spectacled porpoise, Magellanic penguin,

southern rockhopper penguin The southern rockhopper penguin group (''Eudyptes chrysocome''), is a species of rockhopper penguin, that is sometimes considered distinct from the northern rockhopper penguin. It occurs in subantarctic waters of the western Pacific and Indian ...

, upland goose, kelp goose, crested duck, great grebe, flying steamerduck, flightless steamerduck,

black-faced ibis The black-faced ibis (''Theristicus melanopis'') is a species of bird in the family Threskiornithidae. It is found in grassland and fields in southern and western South America. It has been included as a subspecies of the similar buff-necked i ...

, black-crowned night-heron, imperial shag, rock shag,

Neotropic cormorant The neotropic cormorant or olivaceous cormorant (''Nannopterum brasilianum'') is a medium-sized cormorant found throughout the American tropics and subtropics, from the middle Rio Grande and the Gulf and Californian coasts of the United States so ...

black-chested buzzard-eagle The black-chested buzzard-eagle (''Geranoaetus melanoleucus'') is a bird of prey of the hawk and eagle family (Accipitridae). It lives in open regions of South America. This species is also known as the black buzzard-eagle, the gray buzzard-ea ...

turkey vulture The turkey vulture (''Cathartes aura'') is the most widespread of the New World vultures. One of three species in the genus '' Cathartes'' of the family Cathartidae, the turkey vulture ranges from southern Canada to the southernmost tip of So ...

Andean condor The Andean condor (''Vultur gryphus'') is a giant South American Cathartid vulture and is the only member of the genus ''Vultur''. Found in the Andes mountains and adjacent Pacific coasts of western South America, the Andean condor is the larg ...

crested caracara The crested caracara (''Caracara plancus'') is a bird of prey in the family Falconidae. It is found from the southern United States through Central and South America to Tierra del Fuego. It was formerly placed in the genus ''Polyborus''. Descrip ...

, chimango caracara, white-throated caracara, striated caracara, Magellanic oystercatcher,

blackish oystercatcher The blackish oystercatcher (''Haematopus ater'') is a species of wading bird in the oystercatcher family Haematopodidae. It is found in Argentina, Chile, the Falkland Islands and Peru, and is a vagrant to Uruguay. The population is estimate ...

, southern lapwing,

rufous-chested plover The rufous-chested plover (''Charadrius modestus'') or rufous-chested dotterel, is a species of bird in subfamily Charadriinae of family Charadriidae.HBW and BirdLife International (2022) Handbook of the Birds of the World and BirdLife Interna ...

, Baird's sandpiper,

white-rumped sandpiper The white-rumped sandpiper (''Calidris fuscicollis'') is a small shorebird that breeds in the northern tundra of Canada and Alaska. This bird can be difficult to distinguish from other similar tiny shorebirds; these are known collectively as "pee ...

, brown-hooded gull, dolphin gull, South American tern,

kelp gull The kelp gull (''Larus dominicanus''), also known as the Dominican gull, is a gull that breeds on coasts and islands through much of the Southern Hemisphere. The nominate ''L. d. dominicanus'' is the subspecies found around South America, part ...

, Chilean skua, Magellanic diving-petrel, and the

common diving-petrel The common diving petrel (''Pelecanoides urinatrix''), also known as the smaller diving petrel or simply the diving petrel, is a diving petrel, one of four very similar auk-like small petrels of the southern oceans. It is native to South Atlanti ...

Gallery

Image:Beagle Channel - La Isla de Los Lobos.jpg, Sea Lions Island or La Isla de Los Lobos Image:BeagleChannelGlacier.jpg, Romanche Glacier on the north shore of the channel Image:Beagle-Kanal Ushuaia.JPG, Beagle Channel, January 2006 Image:Farofindelmundo2.JPG, View of The Lighthouse Les Eclaireurs called ''End of the World'' near Ushuaia on the north shore of the channel