Riiser-Larsen Sea

Riiser-Larsen Sea

 

a fringing sea of the Indian Ocean on the coast of Antarctica. It extends northward to 65°S lat. In the west along the meridian of 14°E long, it borders the Lazarev Sea, and in the east the Sea of Cosmonauts. Area, 1,138,300 sq km. Depths exceed 3,000 m in most of the sea. It is covered with drifting ice almost all year. There are many icebergs.

The first information about the sea was obtained by the Russian expedition of F. F. Bellingshausen (1819–21). It was explored and described as a self-contained sea by members of a 1962 Soviet antarctic expedition. It was named after H. Riiser-Larsen.