Islands
Despite its enormous size, the Great Chagos Bank is largely a submarine structure. There are only four emerging reefs, mostly located on the western rim of the atoll, except for lonely Nelson Island which lies wholly isolated in the middle of the northern fringe. These reefs have seven or eight individual low and sandy islands, with a total land area of about 4.5 km2 (1.7 sq mi). All islands and their surrounding waters are a Strict Nature Reserve since 1998. The total length of the eastern and southern expanses of the bank, as well as the reefs in its central area are wholly submerged.
The islands of the Great Chagos Bank, starting clockwise from the south, are:
- Danger Island (slightly more than 2 km (1.2 mi) long from North to South, by 1 km (0.62 mi) wide, land area 0.66 km2 (0.25 sq mi), vegetated with palm trees up to 12 m (39 ft) high.
- Eagle Islands
- Île Aigle (Eagle Island, vegetated with high coconut trees, land area 2.45 km2 (0.95 sq mi)
- Sea Cow Island (Île Vache Marine), vegetated with trees, land area 18 hectares (44 acres).
- Three Brothers (Trois Fréres) and Resurgent Islands, vegetated with high coconut trees, land area 0.4 km2 (0.15 sq mi).
- Île du Sud (South Island, largest of the group), 23 ha (57 acres)
- Île du Milieu (Middle Island), 8 ha (20 acres)
- unnamed rocky islet
- Île du Nord (North Island), 6 ha (15 acres)
- Nelson Island (2 km (1.2 mi) long from East to West, up to 0.41 km (0.25 mi) wide, land area 0.4 km2 (0.15 sq mi), with 3 m (9.8 ft) high, bushy vegetation.
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Famous quotes containing the word islands:
“What are the islands to me
if you are lost
what is Naxos, Tinos, Andros,
and Delos, the clasp
of the white necklace?”
—Hilda Doolittle (1886–1961)
“Consider the islands bearing the names of all the saints, bristling with forts like chestnut-burs, or Echinidæ, yet the police will not let a couple of Irishmen have a private sparring- match on one of them, as it is a government monopoly; all the great seaports are in a boxing attitude, and you must sail prudently between two tiers of stony knuckles before you come to feel the warmth of their breasts.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line—the relation of the darker to the lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea. It was a phase of this problem that caused the Civil War.”
—W.E.B. (William Edward Burghardt)