Greenland Sea

Greenland Sea, arm of the Arctic Ocean, off the northeast coast of Greenland between Svalbard and Jan Mayen Island. It is the main outlet of the Arctic Ocean to the Atlantic. Because of drifting arctic ice, the northern part is rarely open to navigation.

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Greenland Sea

the S part of the Arctic Ocean, off the NE coast of Greenland

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Greenland Sea 

a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean, between the islands of Greenland, Iceland, Jan Mayen, Med-vezhii, and Spitsbergen. Area, 1,205,000 sq km; average depth, 1,444 m (maximum, 4,846 m); average volume of water, 1,740 cu km.

The bed of the Greenland Sea is a basin bounded on the east by the submarine Mohns and Knipovich ridges and on the south by the Greenland-Iceland Ridge. On the west the floor of the basin at first rises gradually and then, at the edge of the continental slope, rises rapidly in the direction of the relatively broad shelf of Greenland, which has many hills and troughs. The climate is arctic and severe. Northerly winds prevail year round. The average air temperature in winter is from —25° to -30° C; the average air temperature in summer is from 0° to 6° C. There is frequent cloud cover. The cold East Greenland Current runs along the western part of the sea, carrying with it floating ice all year long; a branch of the Gulf Stream, the warm Spitsbergen Current, flows along the eastern part. There is a vast cyclonal whorl in the central part of the sea. The average water temperature at the surface is a bit lower than - 1°C in February in the north, l°-2° C in the south and southeast, below 0° in August in the northwest, and up to 6° C in the south and east. The temperature at the floor is under -1° C. The salinity in the east is 33.0–34.5 parts per thousand (‰); in the west, 32.0% and less; and at the bottom of the ocean, 34.9‰. The tides are semidiurnal and reach a height of 4.4 m. The color of the water is predominantly green. There is whaling, (Greenland) seal hunting, and fishing. The ports of Longyear City and Barentsburg are located on the fjord of Isfjorden (Spitsbergen), and Akureyri in Iceland.