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International Date Line
The International Date Line (IDL) is the line extending between the South and North Poles that is the boundary between one calendar day and the next. It passes through the Pacific Ocean, roughly following the 180.0° line of longitude and deviating to pass around some territories and island groups. Crossing the date line eastbound decreases the date by one day, while crossing the date line westbound increases the date. The line is a cartographic convention and is not defined by international law. This has made it difficult for cartographers to agree on its precise course and has allowed countries through whose waters it passes to move it at times for their convenience. Geography Circumnavigating the globe People traveling westward around the world must set their clocks: *Back by one hour for every 15° of longitude crossed, and *Forward by 24 hours upon crossing the International Date Line. People traveling eastward must set their clocks: *Forward by one hour for e ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Prime Meridian (Greenwich)
The Greenwich meridian is a prime meridian, a geographical reference line that passes through the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, Royal Observatory, Greenwich, in London, England. From 1884 to 1974, the Greenwich meridian (geography), meridian was the international standard prime meridian, used worldwide for timekeeping and navigation. The modern standard, the IERS Reference Meridian, is based on the Greenwich meridian, but differs slightly from it. This prime meridian (at the time, one of prime meridian, many) was first established by George Biddell Airy, Sir George Airy (in 1851). In 1883, the International Geodetic Association formally recommended to governments that the meridian through Greenwich be adopted as the international standard prime meridian. In October of the following year, at the invitation of the President of the United States, 41 delegates from 25 nations met in Washington, D.C., United States, for the International Meridian Conference. This inter-governmen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Equator
The equator is the circle of latitude that divides Earth into the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Southern Hemisphere, Southern Hemispheres of Earth, hemispheres. It is an imaginary line located at 0 degrees latitude, about in circumference, halfway between the North Pole, North and South Pole, South poles. The term can also be used for any other celestial body that is roughly spherical. In three-dimensional space, spatial (3D) geometry, as applied in astronomy, the equator of a rotating spheroid (such as a planet) is the parallel (circle of latitude) at which latitude is defined to be 0°. It is an imaginary line on the spheroid, equidistant from its geographical pole, poles, dividing it into northern and southern hemispheres. In other words, it is the intersection of the spheroid with the plane (geometry), plane perpendicular to its axis of rotation and midway between its geographical poles. On and near the equator (on Earth), noontime sunlight appears almost directly o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wake Island
Wake Island (), also known as Wake Atoll, is a coral atoll in the Micronesia subregion of the Pacific Ocean. The atoll is composed of three islets – Wake, Wilkes, and Peale Islands – surrounding a lagoon encircled by a coral reef. The nearest inhabited island is Utirik Atoll in the Marshall Islands, located to the southeast. The island may have been found by prehistoric Austronesian peoples, Austronesian mariners before its first recorded discovery by Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira in 1568. Ships continued visiting the area in the following centuries, but the island remained undeveloped until the United States claimed it in 1899. Significant development of the island did not begin until 1935 when Pan American Airways constructed an airfield and hotel, establishing Wake Island as a stopover for Transpacific flight, trans-Pacific flying boat routes. In December 1941 at the opening of the Pacific War, Pacific Theatre of World War II Japan Battle of Wake Island, seized the island ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Northern Mariana Islands
The Northern Mariana Islands, officially the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), is an Territories of the United States, unincorporated territory and Commonwealth (U.S. insular area), commonwealth of the United States consisting of 14 islands in the northwestern Pacific Ocean.Lin, Tom C.W.Americans, Almost and Forgotten 107 California Law Review (2019) The CNMI includes the 14 northernmost islands in the Mariana Islands, Mariana Archipelago; the southernmost island, Guam, is a separate U.S. territory. The Northern Mariana Islands were listed by the United Nations as a non-self-governing territory until 1990. During the colonial period, the Northern Marianas were variously under the control of the Spanish Empire, Spanish, German colonial empire, German, and Empire of Japan, Japanese empires. After World War II, the islands were part of the United Nations trust territories under American administration before formally joining the United States as a territory in 19 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guam
Guam ( ; ) is an island that is an Territories of the United States, organized, unincorporated territory of the United States in the Micronesia subregion of the western Pacific Ocean. Guam's capital is Hagåtña, Guam, Hagåtña, and the most populous village is Dededo. It is the List of extreme points of the United States#Westernmost points, westernmost point and territory of the United States, as measured from the geographic center of the United States, geographic center of the U.S. In Oceania, Guam is the largest and southernmost of the Mariana Islands and the largest island in Micronesia. As of 2022, its population was 168,801. Chamorros are its largest ethnic group, but a minority on the multiethnic island. The territory spans and has a population density of . Indigenous Guamanians are the Chamorro people, Chamorro, who are related to the Austronesian peoples, Austronesian peoples of the Malay Archipelago, the Philippines, Taiwanese indigenous peoples, Taiwan, and Polyne ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Commander Islands
The Commander Islands, Komandorski Islands, or Komandorskie Islands (, ''Komandorskiye ostrova'') are a series of islands in the Russian Far East, a part of the Aleutian Islands, located about east of the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Bering Sea. Treeless and sparsely populated, the islands consist of Bering Island, ; Medny Island, ; and fifteen islets and rocks. The largest of the latter are Tufted Puffin Rock ''(Kamen Toporkov'' or ''Ostrov Toporkov)'', , and Kamen Ariy, which are between west of the only settlement, Nikolskoye. Administratively, the Commanders compose the Aleutsky District of the Kamchatka Krai in Russia. In 2005, the Comandorsky State Nature Reserve was nominated for the List of World Heritage Sites in Russia of UNESCO. Geography The Commander Islands archipelago consists of 15 islands and is a part of a submarine volcanic ridge extending from Alaska to Kamchatka dated by the beginning of Paleogene (60-70 million years ago). The islands are the w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Attu Island
Attu (, ) is an island in the Near Islands (part of the Aleutian Islands chain). It is one of the westernmost points of the U.S. state of Alaska. The island became uninhabited in 2010, making it the largest uninhabited island that is part of the United States politically. (archived June 25, 2017) In the chain of the Aleutians, the islands immediately to the west of Attu are the Russian Commander Islands, away (and on the other side of the International Date Line). Attu is nearly from the Alaskan mainland and northeast of the northernmost of the Kuril Islands of Russia, as well as being from Anchorage, from Alaska's capital of Juneau, and from New York City. Attu is about in size with a land area of , making it #23 on the list of largest islands in the United States. Attu Station, a former Coast Guard LORAN station, is located at , making it one of the westernmost points of the United States relative to the rest of the country. (Technically it is in the Eastern Hemisph ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aleutian Islands
The Aleutian Islands ( ; ; , "land of the Aleuts"; possibly from the Chukchi language, Chukchi ''aliat'', or "island")—also called the Aleut Islands, Aleutic Islands, or, before Alaska Purchase, 1867, the Catherine Archipelago—are a chain of 14 main, larger volcanic islands and 55 smaller ones. Most of the Aleutian Islands belong to the U.S. state of Alaska, with the archipelago encompassing the Aleutians West Census Area, Alaska, Aleutians West Census Area and the Aleutians East Borough, Alaska, Aleutians East Borough. The Commander Islands, located further to the west, belong to the Russian Federal subjects of Russia, federal subject of Kamchatka Krai, of the Russian Far East. The islands form part of the Aleutian Arc of the Northern Pacific Ocean, and occupy a land area of 6,821 sq mi (17,666 km2) that extends westward roughly from the Alaska Peninsula, Alaskan Peninsula mainland, in the direction of the Kamchatka Peninsula; the archipelago acts as a border between ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diomede Islands
The Diomede Islands (; ), also known in Russia as Gvozdev Islands (), consist of two rocky, mesa-like islands: * The Russian island of Big Diomede (part of Chukotka), also known as ', ''Inaliq'', ''Nunarbuk'' or Ratmanov Island * The U.S. island of Little Diomede (part of Alaska) or ', also known as Krusenstern Island The Diomede Islands are located in the middle of the Bering Strait between mainland Alaska and Siberia. If marginal seas are considered, they are the northernmost islands in the Pacific Ocean. To the north is the Chukchi Sea, and to the south is the Bering Sea. Fairway Rock, to the southeast, is also Alaskan but generally not seen as part of the Diomede Islands. Because they are separated by the International Date Line, Big Diomede is almost a day ahead of Little Diomede, but not completely; due to locally defined time zones, Big Diomede is only 21 hours ahead of Little Diomede (20 in summer). Because of this, the islands are sometimes called Tomorrow Island (B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bering Strait
The Bering Strait ( , ; ) is a strait between the Pacific and Arctic oceans, separating the Chukchi Peninsula of the Russian Far East from the Seward Peninsula of Alaska. The present Russia–United States maritime boundary is at 168° 58' 37" W longitude, slightly south of the Arctic Circle at about 65° 40' N latitude. The Strait is named after Vitus Bering, a Danish-born Russian explorer. The Bering Strait has been the subject of the scientific theory that humans migrated from Asia to North America across a land bridge known as Beringia when lower ocean levels – a result of glaciers locking up vast amounts of water – exposed a wide stretch of the sea floor, both at the present strait and in the shallow sea north and south of it. This view of how Paleo-Indians entered America has been the dominant one for several decades and continues to be the most accepted one. Numerous successful crossings without the use of a boat have also been recorded since at least ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Siberia
Siberia ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states since the lengthy conquest of Siberia, which began with the fall of the Khanate of Sibir in 1582 and concluded with the annexation of Chukotka in 1778. Siberia is vast and sparsely populated, covering an area of over , but home to roughly a quarter of Russia's population. Novosibirsk, Krasnoyarsk, and Omsk are the largest cities in the area. Because Siberia is a geographic and historic concept and not a political entity, there is no single precise definition of its territorial borders. Traditionally, Siberia spans the entire expanse of land from the Ural Mountains to the Pacific Ocean, with the Ural River usually forming the southernmost portion of its western boundary, and includes most of the drainage basin of the Arctic Ocean. I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
