The Arctic Circle is one of the five major circles of latitude A circle of latitude, on the Earth, is an imaginary east-west circle connecting all locations that share a given latitude. A location's position along a circle of latitude is given by its longitude that mark maps of the Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets. It is sometimes referred to as the World, the Blue Planet,[note 6] or by its Latin name, Terra.[note 7]. For Epoch 2010, it is the parallel of latitude Latitude, usually denoted by the Greek letter phi gives the location of a place on Earth (or other planetary body) north or south of the equator. Lines of Latitude are the imaginary horizontal lines shown running east-to-west (or west to east) on maps (particularly so in the Mercator projection) that run either north or south of the equator that runs 66º 33′ 43″ (or 66.5619°) north of the Equator An equator is the intersection of a sphere's surface with the plane perpendicular to the sphere's axis of rotation and containing the sphere's center of mass. The capitalized term Equator refers to the Earth's equator. [1]
The region north of this circle is known as the Arctic The Arctic is the region around the Earth's North Pole, opposite the Antarctic region around the South Pole. The Arctic includes the Arctic Ocean (which overlies the North Pole) and parts of Canada, Greenland (a territory of Denmark), Russia, the United States (Alaska), Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland, and the zone just to the south is called the Northern Temperate Zone In geography, temperate or monkey latitudes of the globe lie between the tropics and the polar circles. The changes in these regions between summer and winter are generally relatively moderate, rather than extreme hot or cold. But in continental areas, such as central North America the variations between summer and winter can be extreme. In. The equivalent polar circle A polar circle is either the Arctic Circle or the Antarctic Circle. On Earth, the Arctic Circle is located at a latitude of 66˚ 34', and the Antarctic Circle is located at a latitude of 66˚ 34' S in the Southern Hemisphere The Southern Hemisphere is the half of a planet that is south of the equator—the word hemisphere (from the Greek word σφαιρα +ημι(half)) literally means 'half ball'. It is also that half of the celestial sphere south of the celestial equator is called the Antarctic Circle For Epoch 2010, it is the parallel of latitude that runs 66º 33′ 43″ south of the Equator.
The Arctic Circle marks the southern extremity of the polar day The midnight sun is a natural phenomenon occurring in summer months at latitudes north and nearby to the south of the Arctic Circle, and south and nearby to the north of the Antarctic Circle where the sun remains visible at the local midnight. Given fair weather, the sun is visible for a continuous 24 hours, mostly north of the Arctic Circle and (24-hour sunlit day, often referred to as the "midnight sun") and polar night The polar night occurs when the night lasts for more than 24 hours. This only occurs inside the polar circles. The opposite phenomenon, when the sun stays above the horizon for a long time is called the polar day, or midnight sun (24-hour sunless night). North of the Arctic Circle, the sun The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It has a diameter of about 1,392,000 kilometers , about 109 times that of Earth, and its mass (about 2 × 1030 kilograms, 330,000 times that of Earth) accounts for about 99.86% of the total mass of the Solar System. About three quarters of the Sun's mass consists of hydrogen, while the rest is is above the horizon The horizon is the apparent line that separates earth from sky, the line that divides all visible directions into two categories: those that intersect the Earth's surface, and those that do not. At many locations, the true horizon is obscured by trees, buildings, mountains, etc., and the resulting intersection of earth and sky is called the for 24 continuous hours The hour is a unit of time. It is not an SI unit but is accepted for use with the SI with the symbol h at least once per year A year is the orbital period of the Earth moving around the Sun. For an observer on Earth, this corresponds to the period it takes the Sun to complete one course throughout the zodiac along the ecliptic and below the horizon for 24 continuous hours at least once per year. On the Arctic Circle those events occur, in principle, exactly once per year, at the June and December solstices A solstice is an astronomical event that happens twice each year when the Sun's apparent position in the sky reaches its northernmost or southernmost extremes. The name is derived from the Latin sol and sistere (to stand still), because at the solstices, the Sun stands still in declination; that is, the apparent movement of the Sun's path north or, respectively.
In fact, because of atmospheric refraction Atmospheric refraction is the deviation of light or other electromagnetic wave from a straight line as it passes through the atmosphere due to the variation in air density as a function of altitude. Atmospheric refraction near the ground produces mirages and can make distant objects appear to shimmer or ripple. The term also applies to the and because the sun appears as a disk and not a point, part of the midnight sun may be seen on the night of the summer solstice up to about 50′ The minute is a unit of time equal to 1/60th of an hour or 60 seconds. In the UTC time scale, a minute occasionally has 59 or 61 seconds; see leap second. The minute is not an SI unit; however, it is accepted for use with SI units (90 km (56 mi)) south of the Arctic Circle; similarly, on the day of the winter solstice The Winter Solstice occurs exactly when the Earth's axial tilt is farthest away from the sun at its maximum of 23° 26'. Though the Winter Solstice lasts only an instant in time, the term is also colloquially used as Midwinter or contrastingly the first day of winter to refer to the day on which it occurs. More evident to those in high latitudes,, part of the sun may be seen up to about 50′ north of the Arctic Circle. That is true at sea level; those limits increase with elevation above sea level although in mountainous regions, there is often no direct view of the horizon.
The position of the Arctic Circle is not fixed, but directly depends on the Earth's axial tilt In astronomy, axial tilt is the angle between an object's rotational axis, and a line perpendicular to its orbital plane. It differs from inclination, which fluctuates within a margin of 2° over a 40,000 year period,[2] notably due to tidal forces The tidal force is a secondary effect of the force of gravity and is responsible for the tides. It arises because the gravitational force exerted on one body by a second body is not constant across its diameter. The side nearest to the second body experiences a greater force, while the opposite side experiences a lesser force resulting from the orbit of the Moon The orbit of the Moon around the Earth is completed in approximately 27.3 days. The Earth and Moon orbit about their common center of mass, which lies about 4,700 kilometres from Earth's center . On average, the Moon is at a distance of about 385,000 km from the center of the Earth, which corresponds to about 60 Earth radii. With a mean orbital. The Arctic Circle is currently drifting northwards at a speed of about 15 m (49 ft) per year, see Circle of latitude A circle of latitude, on the Earth, is an imaginary east-west circle connecting all locations that share a given latitude. A location's position along a circle of latitude is given by its longitude for more information.
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Geography
Relatively few people live north of the Arctic Circle due to the Arctic climate. The three largest communities above the Arctic Circle are situated in Russia; Murmansk Murmansk is a city and seaport in the extreme north-west part of Russia, on the Kola Bay, 12 kilometres (7 mi) from the Barents Sea on the northern shore of the Kola Peninsula, not far from Russia's borders with Norway and Finland (population 325,100), Norilsk If this article does not meet the criteria for speedy deletion, or you intend to fix it, please remove this notice, but do not remove this notice from pages that you have created yourself. If you created this page and you disagree with its proposed speedy deletion, please add: (135,000), and Vorkuta Vorkuta is a coal mining town in the Komi Republic, Russia, situated just north of the Arctic circle in the Pechora coal basin at the Usa river. As of 2002[update], its population was 84,917. It had its origin in one of the more notorious forced labour camps of the Gulag which was established in 1932. It was at Vorkuta, in 1937, that the Stalinist (85,000). Tromsø (in Norway) has about 62,000 inhabitants, whereas Rovaniemi Rovaniemi ( pronunciation , Inari Sami: Ruávinjargâ, Northern Sami: Roavenjárga and Roavvenjárga, Skolt Sami: Ruäˊvnjargg) is a city and municipality of Finland. It is the administrative capital and commercial centre of Finland's northernmost province, Lapland. It is situated close to the Arctic Circle and is between the hills of Ounasvaara (in Finland), which lies slightly south of the line, has slightly fewer than 58,000. In contrast, the largest North American community north of the circle, Barrow, Alaska Barrow is a city in and the borough seat of the North Slope Borough in the U.S. state of Alaska. It is one of the northernmost cities in the world, and is the northernmost city in the United States, with nearby Point Barrow being the nation's northernmost point. The population was 4,683 at the 2000 census, with an estimated population of 3,982 in 2, has approximately 4,000 inhabitants.
The Arctic Circle passes through the Arctic Ocean The Arctic Ocean, located in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Arctic north polar region, is the smallest, and shallowest of the world's five major oceanic divisions. The International Hydrographic Organization recognizes it as an ocean, although some oceanographers call it the Arctic Mediterranean Sea or simply the Arctic Sea, classifying, the Scandinavian Peninsula The Scandinavian Peninsula is a geographic region in northern Europe, consisting of Norway, Sweden and part of northern Finland. The name Scandinavian is derived from Scania, a region at the southernmost extremity of the peninsula. The Scandinavian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in Europe, North Asia North Asia or Northern Asia is sometimes defined as a subregion of Asia consisting only of the Asian portion of Russia. The term is not widely used. Sometimes, North Asia is instead used to designate parts of East Asia with Asian Russia lumped with Eastern Europe instead, Northern America Northern America is the northernmost region of the Americas, and is part of the North American continent. It lies directly north of the region of Middle America; the land border between the two regions coincides with the border between the United States and Mexico. Geopolitically, according to the scheme of geographic regions and subregions used and Greenland b. ^ Greenland, the Faeroes and Iceland were formally Norwegian possessions until 1814 despite 400 years of Danish monarchy beforehand. The land on the Arctic Circle is divided among eight countries: Norway After World War II, Norway experienced rapid economic growth, with the first two decades due to the Norwegian shipping and merchant marine and domestic industrialization, and from the early 1970s, a result of exploiting large oil and natural gas deposits that had been discovered in the North Sea and the Norwegian Sea. Today, Norway ranks as the, Sweden Sweden (pronounced /ˈswiːdən/ SWEE-dən, Swedish: Sverige [ˈsvær.jə]), officially the Kingdom of Sweden (Swedish: Konungariket Sverige (help·info)), is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden has land borders with Norway to the west and Finland to the northeast, and water borders with Denmark, Germany and, Finland Finland (pronounced /ˈfɪnlənd/ ), officially the Republic of Finland Finnish: Suomi; Swedish: Finland (help·info), is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden on the west, Norway on the north and Russia on the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland, Russia Russia (pronounced /ˈrʌʃə/ ; Russian: Россия, tr. Rossiya, pronounced [rɐˈsʲijə] ( listen)), also officially known as the Russian Federation (Russian: Российская Федерация, tr. Rossiyskaya Federatsiya, pronounced [rɐˈsʲijskəjə fʲɪdʲɪˈraʦəjə] ( listen)), is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal, the United States ^ b. English is the de facto language of American government and the sole language spoken at home by 80% of Americans age five and older. Spanish is the second most commonly spoken language (i.e. Alaska Alaska was purchased from the Russian Empire on March 30, 1867, for $7.2 million at about two cents per acre . The land went through several administrative changes before becoming an organized territory on May 11, 1912, and the 49th state of the U.S. on January 3, 1959), Canada The land occupied by Canada was inhabited for millennia by various groups of Aboriginal peoples. Beginning in the late 15th century, British and French expeditions explored, and later settled, along the Atlantic coast. France ceded nearly all of its colonies in North America in 1763 after the Seven Years' War. In 1867, with the union of three, Denmark Denmark (pronounced /ˈdɛnmɑrk/ ; Danish: Danmark, pronounced [ˈd̥ænmɑɡ̊], archaic: [ˈd̥anmɑːɡ̊]) is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe and the senior member of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark borders (i.e. Greenland b. ^ Greenland, the Faeroes and Iceland were formally Norwegian possessions until 1814 despite 400 years of Danish monarchy beforehand) and passes through the small Icelandic island of Grímsey just north of Iceland b. ^ Iceland, the Faeroes and Greenland were formally Norwegian possessions until 1814 despite 400 years of Danish monarchy beforehand. Starting at the Prime Meridian The Prime Meridian and its opposite the 180th meridian , which the International Date Line generally follows, form a great circle that divides the Earth into the Eastern and Western Hemispheres and heading eastwards, the Arctic Circle passes through:
See also
| Arctic portal |
- Antarctic circle
- Arctic haze
- Scott Polar Research Institute
- Territorial claims in the Arctic
- Tropic of Cancer
- Tropic of Capricorn
References
External links
| Look up arctic circle in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
- Terra Incognita: Exploration of the Canadian Arctic—Historical essay about early expeditions to the Canadian Arctic, illustrated with maps, photographs and drawings
- Temporal Epoch Calculations ©2006 by James Q. Jacobs Download: Epoch v2009.xls (modify D4)
- Useful constants" See: Obliquity of the ecliptic
- ArcticFocus Facts and news about Arctic
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Categories: Geographic coordinate lists | Lines of latitude | Geography of the Arctic
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MOSNEWS
... hired placard-waving youngsters to greet his sister Irina as she opened an arts festival in Norilsk , a nickel mining town inside the Arctic Circle . ...
Russia's richest man moves to Siberia to pay taxes Wealth Bulletin
Russian billionaire Prokhorov may buy NBA's New Jersey Nets RIA Novosti
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unknown
Sat, 24 Jul 2010 15:26:44 GM
For example, viewing the Northern Lights during trips above the . Arctic Circle. , snow-mobile accessed restaurants, slide shows from local personalities. Visiting thermal baths is a great way to relax tired muscles following vigorous ...
Q. Please help me on this question! Whoever answers it correctly will get voted the best answer by me and possibly other Yahoo! Answers users, and will get 10 points! thanks in advance!
Asked by akshaya614 - Mon Nov 19 22:19:29 2007 - - 4 Answers - 0 Comments
A. The countries are: Norway Sweden Denmark (Greenland is NOT a country in its own right) Iceland Canada United States of America (through Alaska) Russia (or, more accurately, Russia and some other provinces remaining after the breakup of the Soviet Union) Finland
Answered by CanTexan - Tue Nov 20 15:58:42 2007
