Happy WorldOceansDay! Last year cartographers declared there are 5 oceans instead of 4—but can you name them all?
Those familiar with the Southern Ocean, the body of water encircling Antarctica, know it’s unlike any other.
“The Southern Ocean has long been recognized by scientists, but because there was never agreement internationally, we never officially recognized it,” says National Geographic Society Geographer Alex Tait. “It’s sort of geographic nerdiness in some ways,” Tait says. He and the National Geographic Society’s map policy committee had been considering the change for years, watching as scientists and the press increasingly used the term Southern Ocean. to conserve the world’s oceans, focusing public awareness onto a region in particular need of a conservation spotlight.
“While there is but one interconnected ocean, bravo to National Geographic for officially recognizing the body of water surrounding Antarctica as the Southern Ocean,” Earle wrote in an e-mailed statement. “Rimmed by the formidably swift Antarctic Circumpolar Current, it is the only ocean to touch three others and to completely embrace a continent rather than being embraced by them.