#AWW2020 Wild Sea: a history of the southern ocean
- Author: Joy McCann
- Title: Wild Sea: a history of the southern ocean (258 pg)
- Published: 2018
- Genre: non-fiction
- Rating: C+
- Trivia: 2019 Australian Book Industry Awards (ABIA) longlist
- List of Challenges 2020
- Monthly plan
- #AWW2020 @AusWomenWriter
The Southern Ocean:
- Solo sailors call it ‘the South’, as if to emphasize its alien difference.
- The Southern Ocean is a place most of us have never been to
- …and never wish to visit.
- It is a realm of cold grey skies and raging winds
- …that eternally circulate round the bottom of the world.
Antartic Circumpolar Ocean Current:
Ch 1 Ocean – continental drift
- Pangaea –> current pattern of continents –> creation of oceans
- The continents don’t change or move independently
- …but are transported by the shifting tectonic plates.
Ch 2 Winds
Clipper Route…. took advantage of the Roaring Forties and Furious Fifties winds….92 days London — Sydney 1862.
Ch 3 Coast
Located in the southern Indian Ocean off the eastern coast of Africa and just north of Antarctica are the Kerguelen Islands. A French territory, this island group (known as Îles de la Desolation in French) is considered to be one of the most isolated places on Earth. (…2 little white dots!)
Ch 4 Ice
- To sail from the Southern Ocean towards the open waters of the Ross Sea you have to push through the ice a number of times….an ice barrier 100 miles wide.
- As the Southern Ocean is dominated by strong westerly winds it encourages a clockwise route.
- Antartica is only accessible for a few weeks in summer (January-February).
- By March ships risk being trapped in sea ice until the next spring.
- The ice begins to close in trapping you for the winter
- ….an experience no one is likely to survive.
Ch 5 Deep
- The ‘twilight zone is formally known as the dysphotic zone.
- Below 1000 meters lies the midnight zone…complete darkness.
Ch 6 Current
- ANIMATION of Antarctic Bottom Water
- A remarkably detailed animation of the movement of the
- …densest and coldest water in the world around Antarctica.
- The whale is the totem of the Mirning people (Ngargangurie)
Ch 7 Convergence
- The Southern Ocean is no longer simply a remote space devoid of human habitation.
- The Earth is dependent upon the ocean’s heartbeat of seasonal ice
- …its carbon-filled lungs and slow circulation of its deep currents.
- Ocean covers 80 per cent of the Southern Hemisphere.
- Australia sits at an ocean cross-roads.
- Changes in the southern oceans may also alter the
- ….climate processes that control rainfall over Australia.
- We need to understand the influence of the
- …southern oceans on climate and sea levels.
- This book is a good place to start!
- #Bravo Joy McCann
Conclusion:
- Detailing a mysterious realm that’s as vital to our existence as the air we breathe.
- Wild Sea: a history of the southern ocean
- is
- As the title says …it is a history
- …and Joy McCann uses many 19th C references.
- I must applaud the author because in her NOTES
- …she also includes many links to websites
- …(Kindle edition) with a trove of information.
- The only weak point in the book is
- ….I was always tempted to leave the text to often and explore
- the links she provided!
- PS: book contains some beautiful illustrations
- ….perfect viewing with Kindle!
- (…I never knew an albatross could be so big!! …see foto)
- Reading tips:
- Roving Mariners: Australian Aboriginal Whalers and Sealers in the Southern Oceans (2012)
- Slicing the Silence: Voyaging to Antarctica – T. Griffiths (2010)
Love the whale picture 🐳
LikeLike
….and did you love the review?
LikeLike