The Continental Shelf

<p>Around the coasts of all the land masses, between low-tide level at about the 100-fathom mark is a shallow platform known as the continental shelf, from which the higher parts project as islands. The shelf slopes gently seaward with an angle of less than one degree. It is well developed off Western Europe, where it extends westward for 200 miles from south-west Britain, and off north-eastern North America, while off the Arctic coast of Siberia it is about 750 miles wide. Detailed hydrographic surveys in the Canadian Arctic have outlined a continental shelf 75 to 100 miles in width to the north of Canada, covered with water to 100 fathoms, and abruptly dropping by the continental slope to deep water. Around the continents it is much narrower, or almost completely absent, especially along coasts where fold mountains run parallel and close to the sea, as along the edge of the eastern Pacific.</p> <p><a href="https://medium.com/@johnwelford15/the-continental-shelf-756bb8d8605f"><strong>Click Here</strong></a></p>