Amundsen Sea
part of the Southern Ocean
The Amundsen Sea is an arm of the Southern Ocean off Marie Byrd Land in western Antarctica. It lies between Cape Flying Fish (the northwestern tip of Thurston Island) to the east and Cape Dart on Siple Island to the west. Cape Flying Fish marks the boundary between the Amundsen Sea and the Bellingshausen Sea. West of Cape Dart there is no named marginal sea of the Southern Ocean between the Amundsen and Ross Seas. The Norwegian expedition of 1928–1929 under Captain Nils Larsen named the body of water for the Norwegian polar explorer Roald Amundsen while exploring this area in February 1929.
The sea is mostly ice-covered, and the Thwaites Ice Tongue protrudes into it. The ice sheet which drains into the Amundsen Sea averages about 3 km (1.9 mi) in thickness; roughly the size of the state of Texas, this area is known as the Amundsen Sea Embayment (ASE); it forms one of the three major ice-drainage basins of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.
Embayment
The ice sheet that drains into the Amundsen Sea averages about 3 km (1.9 mi) in thickness. It is roughly the size of the state of Texas and is known as the Amundsen Sea Embayment (ASE); it forms one of the three major ice drainage basins of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet along with the Ross Sea Embayment and the Weddell Sea Embayment.
Some scientists proposed that this region may be a weak underbelly of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Amundsen Sea” is part of the Southern Ocean. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Amundsen, part and Southern, not as a finished interpretation.
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The phrase “part of the Southern Ocean” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 15, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q72154. VIAF identifies the subject as 2429163513752211230009. The Library of Congress control number is sh99000362. Authority coordinates are -73.000, -112.000. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1928 and 1929.
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This entry incorporates text from “Amundsen Sea” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.