The Red Sea
The Red Sea (Arabic: البحر الأحمر al-Bahr al-Ahmar) is an intracontinental sea of the Indo-Pacific basin between North Africa and the Middle East with an area of approximately 450,000 km². It is a sea of great strategic and commercial importance which allows navigators from the Mediterranean Sea to the Indian Ocean, or vice versa, not to be forced to go around Africa .
Red Sea is a direct translation of the Greek Erythra Thalassa and the Latin Mare Rubrum. The Hebrews called it “sea of Edom” (or “sea of the Edumeans”, adom meaning “red” in Hebrew - the Edomites being the descendants of Esau, brother of Jacob1), the Turks, Kızıldeniz, Kızıl meaning red. The Romans named it Sinus arabicus (the "Arabian Gulf"). The Latin writer Quinte-Curce in the History of Alexander the Great, describing the landscape that the latter crosses during the journey which will lead him to India, speaks of the Red Sea by explaining the following: "His name comes to him from King Erythrus, which is why the ignoramuses believe that its waters are red ”. According to him, the name of the sea comes from the king of the neighboring countries, while in Greek the term erythros means red, hence confusion.
Although normally2, the color of the Red Sea is an intense blue-green, one of the commonly advanced hypotheses is that occasional blooms of "algae" (in fact a cyanobacterium) of the species Trichodesmium erythraeum . When they die, they give the water a reddish color3 due to a red internal pigment, phycoerythrin4. However, it is much more likely that its name comes from the universal designation of the southern cardinal point according to the geochromatic code used since ancient times. However, in Arabia, the red indicates the western cardinal point since the sedentarization and the constitution of the borders5.
The International Hydrographic Organization determines the limits of the Red Sea.
The Red Sea is located between Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. To the south, the Red Sea communicates with the Gulf of Aden through the Strait of Bab-el-Mandeb. To the north, two gulfs, separated by the Sinai Peninsula, are adjacent to it: to the west, the Gulf of Suez (which communicates with the Mediterranean by the Suez Canal); to the east, the Gulf of Aqaba. It is useful to specify that, according to the International Hydrographic Organization (see above), these two gulfs are maritime spaces in their own right and which, therefore, are not part of the Red Sea.
The Red Sea is approximately 1,914 km long (from the south of the Gulf of Suez), with a maximum width of 300 km and a maximum depth of 2,500 meters in the central median pit, with an average depth of 500 meters.
It is dotted with various islands and archipelagos among which, from north to south, we note: Giftoun, Zabargad, the Dahlak Archipelago, the Farasan Islands or the Hanish Islands.
The countries bordering the Red Sea are Djibouti, Eritrea, Sudan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Yemen.
Among the most known Red Sea coastal cities: Assab, Port Sudan, Port Safaga, Hurghada, Sharm el-Sheikh, Douba, Yanbu, Jeddah and al-Hodeida. Tadjourah, Obock.
The surface temperatures of the Red Sea water are relatively constant, between 21 and 25 ° C, making it one of the warmest seas in the world. Visibility remains relatively good up to 200 meters deep, but winds can rise quickly and sea currents can be treacherous.
Fauna and flora
There are many shoals in the Red Sea, renowned for the exuberance of the underwater life that is found there, be it many varieties of fish or magnificent corals. The temperature is relatively high and allows them to develop in a luxuriant way. It is populated by more than 1,000 species of invertebrates, 200 species of corals and at least 300 species of sharks.
The gulfs of Suez, Aqaba and the Red Sea as seen by a NASA satellite.
The Red Sea is one of the most salty seas in the world with a salinity of 42 USP while in general the oceans have a salinity of 35 USP. The water of the Red Sea being therefore denser, the principle of Archimedes guarantees that a body will float better than in the ocean, a fortiori better than in fresh water.
The Red Sea was formed during the separation of the Arab plate from the African plate. The divergence is dated to the Oligocene (see Geological timescale) and continues today, which explains the existence of volcanic activity in the deepest parts. The existence of an active ridge at the bottom of the Red Sea makes it, from a geological point of view, an ocean. The prediction of the evolution of movements of the lithosphere not being possible, one can be satisfied to say that it is possible that the oceanic expansion continues, leading in the future to an ocean in the geographical sense of the term.
“Police Station” dive site on Giftoun Soraya in Hurghada
The Egyptians were the first to attempt a mission to explore the Red Sea.
The Bible in the book of Exodus tells the famous story of the crossing of the Red Sea that Moses led the Israelites to freedom through water, using the power of God to share the waters.
It was a Greek navigator, Hippalus, who gave an international dimension to the Red Sea in his manifesto on the voyage of the Eritrean Sea and thus opened it up to immense and exclusive trade with Asia. It was not until around the 15th century that Europe began to show interest in this area. Major as a place of economic and military circulation, the Red Sea then became a sector of confrontation between Muslims, Christians, Europeans, etc. The Portuguese’s plans to conquer Abyssinia in particular (now Ethiopia) made it all the more difficult to access since the Muslims had gained the upper hand, particularly on the commercial front.
In June 2008, the Dubai-based company Middle East Development, owned by the bin Laden family, announced that it wanted to build a 28.5 km long bridge over the Red Sea in order to link the Yemen and Djibouti. The project also includes the creation of urban areas on either side of the structure7.
The Red Sea is a famous tourist destination, especially for lovers of scuba diving. Longiman and mako sharks have caused serious accidents to swimmers (mutilation, amputation, drowning).
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