Laptev Sea average water temperature. Laptev Sea

Laptev sea- marginal sea of ​​the Arctic Ocean. The sea surface area is 662,000 km². Located between the northern coast of Siberia in the south, the Taimyr Peninsula, the islands Severnaya Zemlya in the west and the New Siberian Islands in the east. Historical names: Tatarskoe, Lenskoe (on maps of the 16th-17th centuries), Sibirskoe, Ledovitoe (18th-19th centuries). In 1883, polar explorer Fridtjof Nansen named the sea after Nordenskiöld. This name remained with him until 1935. In 1913, at the suggestion of oceanographer Yu. M. Shokalsky, the Russian Geographical Society approved the current name - in honor of cousins ​​Dmitry and Khariton Laptev, who explored this harsh territory back in the 18th century. It was formalized only by a decision of the USSR Central Executive Committee dated June 27, 1935. In the language of the indigenous people, the Yakuts, the name sounds like Laptevtar.

The banks are heavily indented. Large bays: Khatanga, Olenyoksky, Faddeya, Yansky, Anabarsky, Maria Pronchishcheva Bay, Buor-Khaya. There are several dozen islands in the western part of the sea and river deltas. Frequent storms and currents due to melting ice lead to severe erosion, for example Semenovsky and Vasilyevsky Islands, discovered in 1815, have already disappeared. The most significant groups of islands: Severnaya Zemlya, Komsomolskaya Pravda and Thaddeus. The largest single islands are: Bolshoi Begichev (1764 km²), Belkovsky (500 km²), Maly Taimyr (250 km²), Stolbovoy (170 km²), Starokadomskogo Island (110 km²), and Peschany (17 km²). The islands of Komsomolskaya Pravda are located in the southwestern part of the sea. The following rivers flow into the sea: Khatanga, Anabar, Olenyok, Lena, Yana. Some rivers form large deltas.

Sailing

The coast of the Laptev Sea has long been inhabited by indigenous tribes of northern Siberia, such as the Yukaghirs and Chuvans. Traditional activities These tribes practiced fishing, hunting, nomadic reindeer herding, and wild deer hunting. Starting from the 2nd century, the gradual assimilation of the Yukaghirs by the Evens and Evenks began, and from the 9th century by the much more numerous Yakuts, and later by the Koryaks and Chukchi. Russians began exploring the Laptev Sea coast and nearby islands around the 17th century by rafting down the Siberian rivers. In 1629, Siberian Cossacks descended the Lena to the mouth. In 1633, Ivan Perfiryev’s detachment set off from Zhigansk down the Lena, then half of the detachment led by Ivan Rebrov reached the mouth of the Olenyok River, and Perfiryev himself went to the Yana. By 1638, the Khatanga River was discovered and industrialists from the Lena ascended it, dragged along the internal waters of Taimyr to Pyasina and hunted on the banks of the Yenisei. In 1735, on the doublet-boat "Yakutsk", Lieutenant Vasily Pronchishchev sailed from the Lena to the mouth of the Anabar and to east coast Taimyr. After Pronchishchev's death from scurvy in 1736, his work on the Yakutsk was continued by Khariton Laptev, whose cousin Dmitry Laptev in 1739 sailed on the Irkutsk boat from the mouth of the Lena to the east to the mouth of the Khroma River, which flows into the East Siberian Sea. The strait between the two seas is named after Dmitry Laptev. And the Siberian Sea itself is named after the Laptevs, since they were the first to map its shores.

Navigation in the Laptev Sea became possible thanks to the work (1821-1823) of Lieutenant Peter Anzhu, who described the coast of the mainland and all the New Siberian Islands, which he traveled on sleds in search of the never found Sannikov Land. Anjou conducted the first studies of the prevailing winds of the Laptev Sea, its moving and pack ice. He took depth measurements, moving either on the water in a boat or on the ice on a sleigh.

The first who managed to sail across the entire Laptev Sea from Cape Chelyuskin in the west to Cape Svyatoy Nos in the east was the Swedish baron Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld. His sailing and steam ship "Vega", accompanied by the steamer "Lena", anchored at Cape Chelyuskin on August 19, 1875, and on August 27 reached the mouth of the Lena, where the "Lena" went, heading to Yakutsk. On August 30, "Vega" was in the Dmitry Laptev Strait off the coast of Bolshoi Lyakhovsky Island. In 1893, almost the entire Laptev Sea was passed by the Norwegian research schooner "Fram" of Fridtjof Nansen, which froze in the ice near the New Siberian Islands, from where its drift to the north began.

At the beginning of the 20th century, Russian expeditions crossed the sea several times on the icebreaking ships "Taimyr" and "Vaigach". Since 1932, the Northern Sea has been running through the Laptev Sea. sea ​​route, regular flights since 1935. The navigation period here is the shortest on the entire Northern Sea Route - only in August and September. The base port is Tiksi, there are also ports at the mouths of the rivers - Khatanga, Ust-Olenyok, Nizhneyansk.

Bottom relief

The Laptev Sea is located in the shelf zone, the continental slope, and occupies a small area of ​​the ocean floor. Due to this location, the bottom topography is a plain, which ends abruptly in the north. The predominant depths are up to 50 m, the greatest depth is 3385 meters, the average depth is 540 meters. In shallow areas, the bottom is covered with sand and silt mixed with pebbles and boulders. River sediments accumulate near the banks high speed, up to 20-25 centimeters per year. At great depths the bottom is covered with silt.

Climate and hydrological regime

The climate of the Laptev Sea is Arctic continental and, due to its distance from the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, is one of the harshest among the Arctic seas. The polar night and polar day last about 3 months a year in the south and 5 months in the north. The coldest month is January. The average temperature in January is −31°C and −34°C, and the minimum is −50°C. In July, the temperature rises to 0 °C +5 °C, however, it can reach +22-24 °C on the coast in August. Strong winds, snowstorms and snow storms are common in winter. Snow falls even in summer and alternates with fog.

The sea is characterized by low water temperatures. In winter, under the ice, the water temperature ranges from −0.8°C−1.8°C. In summer, in ice-free areas of the sea, the uppermost layer of water can warm up to 4-6°C, in bays up to 8-10°C. The salinity of sea water at the surface in the northwestern part of the sea in winter is 34 ‰, in the southern part - up to 20-25 ‰. Near river mouths it is less than 10 ‰. The salinity of surface waters is strongly influenced by the melting of ice and the runoff of Siberian rivers. Most of the river flow (about 70%) falls on the Lena. Other rivers making a significant contribution to the total flow: Khatanga, Olenyok, Yana and Anabar. Tides reach an average height of 50 centimeters. The magnitude of the tides is significantly reduced by the ice cover. In Khatanga Bay, due to its funnel-shaped shape, tidal waves can reach 2 meters. Due to relatively weak winds and shallow depths, the Laptev Sea is relatively calm, with waves usually within 1 meter. In July-August, waves up to 4-5 m high can be observed in the open sea, and in the autumn they can reach 6 meters.

Frosty Arctic winters cause significant formation sea ​​ice, which covers the sea area almost all year. The development of ice is also facilitated by the shallowness of the sea and the low salinity of its surface waters. The Laptev Sea is the largest source of Arctic sea ice.

Flora and fauna

Flora and fauna are sparse due to the harsh climate. The sea vegetation is represented mainly by diatoms, of which there are more than 100 species. 39 species of fish have been recorded in the sea, most of them typical of brackish water environments. The main ones are various types of grayling and whitefish, such as muksun, broad whitefish, and omul. Sardines, Bering Sea omul, polar smelt, navaga, cod, flounder, Arctic char and nelma are also common. Mammals that permanently live here include: walrus, bearded seal, ringed seal, harp seal, hoofed lemming, arctic fox, reindeer, wolf, ermine, arctic hare and polar bear. Beluga whales make seasonal migrations to the shore.

Several dozen species of birds live here. Some of them are sedentary and live here permanently. These are the snow bunting, sandpiper, snowy owl and brent goose. There are also those that wander around the polar regions or migrate from the south, creating large colonies on the islands and the coast of the mainland. These include the auk, common guillemot, ivory gull, guillemot, charibiformes and the Arctic gull. Also found are skuas, terns, fulmars, glaucous gulls, pink gulls, long-tailed ducks, eiders, loons and ptarmigan. In 1985, the Ust-Lena Nature Reserve was organized in the Lena River delta. In 1993, all the islands of the Novosibirsk archipelago were also included in its protective zone.

Economic importance

The Laptev Sea is the only Russian sea where there is not a single inhabited island with a permanent population excluding polar stations and military installations. Hunting and fishing are poorly distributed and concentrated mainly in river deltas. Hunting for marine mammals is practiced only by indigenous people. In particular, walrus hunting is permitted only to scientific expeditions and local tribes that require it for their subsistence. The Northern Sea Route is the most important way to deliver goods to remote areas of Russia - the north of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, Yakutia and Chukotka. The Laptev Sea is the site of various scientific research. Scientists study how water circulates, monitor ice balance, and make hydrometeorological forecasts.

Ecology

Water pollution is relatively low and mainly occurs due to the operation of numerous factories and mines located on the Lena, Yana and Anabar rivers. The waste from these enterprises contains phenols, copper and zinc and is constantly washed into the sea with river waters. Another constant source of pollution is the urban-type settlement of Tiksi. During navigation, as well as during oil production, periodic spills occur. Another major source of pollution is sunken and floating decaying wood that ended up in the water as a result of decades of constant timber rafting.

The Laptev Sea has the status of a marginal sea belonging to. It not only has a fairly harsh climate, but is also under an ice crust for 9 months.

General description of the Laptev Sea

The sea is limited to the northern shores of Russia, as well as the coasts of islands such as Severnaya Zemlya, the New Siberian Islands and the Taimyr Peninsula. On the eastern part the reservoir is adjacent to the sea, and on the western part – with.

Sea map

There are several dozen islands in this area, and most of them are located in the west. There are many single skeletons here, as well as entire groups of them. The largest of them can be considered the skeleton Komsomolskaya Pravda, Maly and Thaddeus.
On coastline the sea can be seen a large number of various bays and bays. In addition to the Taimyr Peninsula, peninsulas such as Nordvik and Khara-Tumus deserve special attention. Some of the largest bays include the Khatanga, Anabar, and Yana bays. Tiksi is considered the largest bay and port in this area.
Until 1935, the Laptev Sea had a completely different name - the Nordenskiöld Sea. Later, it was decided to give the reservoir a new name in honor of the famous explorer brothers Khariton and Dmitry.

Bottom relief of the Laptev Sea

The key location of the sea can be called the zone of the continental slope, the shelf, as well as a small area belonging to the ocean bed. The topography of the seabed can confidently be called flat, but a sharp cliff was discovered in its northern part. One of the sea trenches can be found near the mouth of the Lena River. The same relief formation can be seen next to Oleneksky Bay and Stolbovoy Island.
In general, the depth of the Laptev Sea is not that bad - on average, this figure ranges from 50 to 80 meters. But when moving north, the depth of the seabed increases sharply from 100 meters to 2000 meters.
In shallower areas the bottom is covered with silt and sand, partly mixed with pebbles, while at higher depths only silt deposits are found. The rock mass contains a high ice content, which increases the rate of abrasion of nearby shores. Not only melting ice, but also constant surf can lead to the destruction of entire small islands. In the Nansen Basin, the maximum depth of the seabed was discovered - 3385 meters.
The following waters flow towards the Laptev Sea: large rivers, like Khatanga and Lena. Many other, but much smaller rivers are involved in the desalination of the sea. Typically, this period falls on the summer-autumn season - from May to September.

Hydrological regime of the Laptev Sea

The Laptev Sea has a distinctive feature from all the seas of the Arctic Ocean and in general, namely strong and prolonged cooling of the waters with a relatively calm winter. As for the current system, but so far modern researchers do not have enough information on them. One thing is certain, that the circulation system is cyclonic.
Educated fresh waters The water cycle moves counterclockwise, as, indeed, in other Arctic-type seas. The currents that formed this a natural phenomenon, are very unstable and do not have great speed.
Almost throughout the year, the water temperature, with rare exceptions, rises above zero. The surface of the sea begins to warm up only closer to summer, when the waters completely emerge from under the ice. In August, the temperature of surface waters can reach +140 C.
It is possible to track changes in temperature with increasing depth only in summer season. Near open sea most often there is a minus temperature within -1.60 C. At significant depths, due to the influx of third-party waters, this figure rises to 0.2 ° C. Under these same conditions, the salinity of the waters also increases. According to general indicators, the sea has low salinity. In the north, this parameter can reach 34‰, and closer to the south - 5‰ (which is typical for the summer season).

Flora and fauna of the Laptev Sea

TO flora This area is mostly composed of phytoplankton, which represents more than 100 species of diatoms. Zooplankton also lives here in large numbers. This group includes microorganisms such as amphipods, marine ciliates, copepods and rotifers.
From the fish world, it is worth highlighting the following species: cod, navaga, capelin, sturgeon and nelma. Scientists also have an assumption that representatives of the shark family such as the Katrana, polar and herring sharks can swim into the Laptev waters.
In coastal areas, seagulls and other species of seabirds often organize so-called “bird markets”. The most common animals are seals, beluga whales, polar bears and walruses.

The Laptev Sea is one of the most interesting, important and useful bodies of water existing in the country. It is adjacent to the Arctic Ocean and is characterized by low temperature and low salinity of water. The sea is covered with ice for 10 months of the year. Specific features- poor fauna and flora, a small number of people on the coast and islands within the sea, on some of which the remains of mammoths can still be found.

The name “Laptev Sea” did not appear by chance. This is the merit of travelers with the corresponding surname - brothers Dmitry and Khariton. Previously, the reservoir bore the name of Norsköld (thanks to the suggestion of Fridtjof Nansen), and was also called the Tatar, Lena, Siberian and Arctic Seas.

Shores of the Laptev Sea

The Laptev Sea has an area of ​​672 thousand km² and a volume of 363 thousand km². Maximum depth The reservoir considered in the article is over 3000 meters, the average depth is 540 meters. The shores stretch for 1300 km and form bays and bays of various sizes. The most impressive bays include Khatanga, Yansky, Maria Pronchishcheva Bay and a number of others.

Several rivers flow into the Laptev Sea, in the deltas of which there are several dozen islands, often subject to erosion. The most famous of the rivers flowing into the reservoir is the Lena. To the number most important islands include Severnaya Zemlya, Bolshoi Begichev, Maly Taimyr, Belkovsky and Thaddeya.

The reservoir is a habitat for approximately 40 various types fish, most of which prefer salt water. These are grayling and whitefish, sardines and Bering Sea omul, smelt, cod, flounder and some other types of fish. Within the Laptev Sea there live many mammals - walruses, ermine, polar hare, polar bear, etc.

In addition to the above, there is a bird here. Among sedentary birds we should highlight the snow bunting, sandpiper, polar owl and brent goose. The rest wander around the polar regions or fly in from the south. Thus, the reservoir is excellent for fishing and hunting, although both of these activities are not particularly common.

In the 80s of the last century in the area of ​​the river. Lena reserve has been formed. In the 90s, its protective zone expanded significantly to include the islands of the Novosibirsk archipelago. Now total area The territory exceeds 14 thousand km². This is the habitat of many fish, plants, birds and mammals, including those that can be seen on the pages of the Red Book.

Cities on the Laptev Sea

(Tiksi village)

The largest settlement in size is the village of Tiksi, where the Arctic sea ​​port with the same name. This is a place of import of food, industrial goods, building materials, equipment, fuel and export of timber and lumber. About 5 thousand people live in the village. To other significant ones settlements includes the villages of Bykovsky (519 people) and Khatanga (2645 people).

Located between the Taimyr Peninsula and the Severnaya Zemlya Islands in the west and the New Siberian Islands in the east.

Area 662,000 sq. km.

The predominant depths are up to 50 m, the greatest depth is 3385 m.

Large bays: Khatanga, Olenyoksky, Faddeya, Yansky, Anabarsky, Maria Pronchishcheva Bay, Buor-Khaya. There are many islands in the western part of the sea.
The islands of Komsomolskaya Pravda are located in the southwestern part of the sea.
The following rivers flow into the sea: Khatanga, Anabar, Olenyok, Lena, Yana.
The main port is Tiksi.

Most of the year (October to May) Laptev sea covered with ice. Ice formation begins at the end of September and occurs simultaneously throughout the entire sea. In winter, in its shallow eastern part, extensive fast ice up to 2 m thick is developed. The limit of the distribution of fast ice is a depth of approximately 25 m, which in this area of ​​the sea is several hundred kilometers away from the coast. The area of ​​fast ice is approximately 30% of the area of ​​the entire sea. In the western and northwestern parts of the sea, fast ice is small, and in some winters it is completely absent. To the north of the fast ice zone there are drifting ice.

The average air temperature in January is about –30°С; in the coastal part there are frosts down to –60°С. Most of covered with ice for years; There is wide fast ice along the coast, the Siberian polynya extends to the north, and the Taimyr ice massif is preserved to the east of the Vilkitsky Strait. Salinity from 10 (or less) in the south to 34 ‰ in the north; The tides are semidiurnal, up to 0.5 m.
IN Laptev sea The tides are well defined and have an irregular semidiurnal pattern everywhere. The tidal wave enters from the north from the Central Arctic Basin, attenuating and deforming as it moves south. The magnitude of the tide is usually small, mostly about 0.5 m. Only in the Khatanga Bay the range of tidal level fluctuations exceeds 2 m at syzygy. Other rivers flowing into Laptev sea, the tide is almost out. It fades very close to the mouths, since the tidal wave is extinguished in the deltas of these rivers.

Fauna and flora of the Laptev Sea

are typically arctic. Phytoplankton is represented by marine diatoms and diatoms of desalinated waters. The most widespread species of zooplankton here are planktonic marine ciliates, rotifers, copepods and amphipods. Benthic organisms include foraminifera, polychaetes, isopods, bryozoans and molluscs. Fish are represented by Siberian whitefish, Arctic char, omul, nelma, sturgeon, etc.

Mammals include walruses, seals and beluga whales, bearded seals, and seals; there are bird colonies on the banks; There are many commercial fish: char, muksun, nelma, taimen, perch, sturgeon, sterlet. Polar bears live on ice islands and large ice fields in the open sea. Colonies of sea gulls live near the coasts.

The Laptev Sea is located on the continental plate of the Eurasian continent. Its borders are the Kara Sea, the Arctic Ocean basin and the East Siberian Sea. It owes its name to the Laptev brothers, who dedicated their lives to exploring the North. Its other names - Nordenskiölde and Siberian - are less relevant. The area of ​​the sea is 672,000 square meters. km., depths of up to 50 meters prevail everywhere. Only a fifth of the bottom is submerged to more than 1000 meters. The maximum depth was recorded in the Nansen Basin and is equal to 3385 m. The seabed is muddy in deep places and sandy-silty - in smaller ones.

Due to the huge number of rivers flowing into the Nordenskiöld, the sea surface has a low concentration of salt. The Laptev Sea receives the most water from Khatanga and Lena, the main arteries of Siberia. The sea temperature is rarely above zero. This is one of the harshest places on the planet.

But life has not ignored this part of our planet. Despite the fact that the surface of the sea is almost always covered with ice and despite the small amount of sunlight, vegetation can be found on the shore. The flora here is represented by various diatoms and other microscopic algae. Planktonic microorganisms can also be detected.

The coastline is heavily indented. The steep banks are dotted with birds that fly here to raise their young. Seagulls, guillemots, guillemots and many other birds breed their chicks here. Bird eggs attract small predators, such as Arctic foxes, who are not averse to indulging in the delicacy. They also attract larger animals, such as polar bears. Along the continental strip along the coast there are also stars, mollusks and other small inhabitants of the deep sea.

There are about 40 species of fish in the Laptev Sea - cod, omul, and many others. Mining is not possible due to the ice crust on the surface. Sport fishing is also poorly developed due to the distance of the sea from residential areas.

Mammals here include walruses, minke whales, seals and beluga whales. Their extraction is also completely undeveloped for the reasons described above. Nothing is known about the existence of sharks in the waters of the Laptev Sea. But we can assume that such conditions are quite suitable for polar shark. In more warm time from neighboring seas can get here

Recently, a large number of projects related to shelf and gas have begun to appear. This is due to low depths over most of the area of ​​the entire sea. Good seismic study of the bottom provides excellent prerequisites for drawing conclusions about high oil and gas content. Shallow depths make it possible to drill not from special offshore platforms, but from bulk islands.

Currently, oil companies Lukoil and Rosneft are planning to drill the first wells in the Laptev Sea. Each, in turn, will have to bring foreign partners to the shelf. All that remains is to wait for the moment when the development of the Laptev Sea begins.