NJROTC Academic Team NS2 Textbook Quizlet

*What was the worst oil-pollution catastrophe in history?

Deepwater Horizon

*What is the most important strategic area in the Caribbean?

Panama Canal

What is the largest island in the Caribbean?

Cuba

When did the US reverse sanctions against Cuba?

2009

What US naval base is located in Cuba?

Guantanamo Bay

What was the first vessel to reach the North Pole under the ice?

USS Nautilus

What territory was forcibly annexed by Russia in 2014?

Crimean Peninsula

What are the key choke points in the Mediterranean?

Turkish Straits (Bosporus and the Dardanelles) and the Suez Canal

Where is the headquarters of US Africa Command?

Stuttgart, Germany

*What sea has no known oil deposits?

The Red Sea

What country did the United States withdraw from a nuclear agreement with in 2018?

Iran

What strategic waterway is the main route between Asia and Europe?

Strait of Malacca

What nations exploded nuclear test devices in 1998?

India and Pakistan

How large is the Pacific Ocean?

59 million square miles or 35% of Earth's surface

What is the average depth of the Pacific Ocean?

12,900 feet

What is the deepest spot on Earth?

Marianas Trench, 36,161 ft, in the Pacific Ocean

Seamounts

An underwater mountain rising from the ocean floor and having a peaked or flat-topped summit below the surface of the sea.

What is the largest coral reef?

Australia's Great Barrier Reef

What are the major ports on the west coast of the United States?

San Diego, Los Angeles, Long Beach, and Oakland, California; Tacoma and Seattle, Washington; and Anchorage, Alaska

What is the major US port in the mid-Pacific?

Honolulu, Hawaii

What part of a cyclone has the highest wind intensity?

Eye wall

What US naval bases are located in the Pacific?

Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, Guam, and Yokosuka, Japan

Extratropical low

A low pressure weather system outside the tropics

How many US personnel are stationed in South Korea?

25,000

When is hurricane season?

June to November

When were full diplomatic relations established between China and the US?

1979

What was the only hurricane in the South Atlantic?

Hurricane Catarina

*Where were Chinese protestors attacked by tanks in 1979?

Tiananmen Square

What was the most damaging hurricane in the US?

Hurricane Katrina

*Cosmology

the study of the origin, properties, processes, and evolution of the universe

What are the dangerous quadrants of a cyclone?

Right front in the Northern Hemisphere and left front in the southern hemisphere

When was our solar system formed?

4.6 billion years ago

What are the types of semicircles of a cyclone?

Semicircles in dangerous quadrants are dangerous semicircles, left semicircles in the northern hemisphere and right semicircles in the southern hemisphere are navigable semicircles

*Lithosphere

the rigid outer part of the earth, consisting of the crust and upper mantle.

What is the small craft warning signal?

Red pennant or red light over white, up to 33 knots

Asthenosphere

The soft layer of the mantle on which the lithosphere floats.

What is the gale warning signal?

Two red pennants or white light over red, 34-37 knots

Mesosphere

The strong, lower part of the mantle between the asthenosphere and the outer core

What is the storm warning signal?

Square red flag or two red lights, 48-63 knots

Theory of the movement of landmasses

Continental drift/plate tectonics

What is the hurricane warning signal?

Two square red flags or white light between two red, 64+ knots

What was the largest disaster from an earthquake of all time?

Tangshan, China in 1976

What is used to find the depth of water over which a vessel is traveling?

Echo sounders or fathometers

Fathoms

Unit used to measure depth of water, equal to 6 ft

submarine fan

A cone-shaped sedimentary deposit that accumulates on the continental slope and rise.

What is the last frontier on Earth?

The deep ocean floor

Ocean ridges

Mountain ranges on the deep ocean floor

Atoll

a ring-shaped reef, island, or chain of islands formed of coral.

Seamounts

Remnants of former coral islands

Guyots

underwater volcanic mountains with flat tops

*What is the purest natural source of water?

Snow

What are the freezing and boiling points of water?

0 and 100 degrees C or 32 and 212 degrees F

*What is the only liquid with a higher heat storage capacity than water?

Ammonia

What is the salinity of seawater?

3.5% or 35 parts per thousand

Transpiration

Evaporation of water from the leaves of a plant

Bathythermograph (BT)

Checks water temperatures at various depths

Ocean zones from highest to lowest

Lighted zone, twilight zone, dark zone

Breakwater

a barrier that protects a harbor or shore from the full impact of waves

Rip currents

strong and relatively narrow currents of water that flow seaward against breaking waves

Coriolis effect

The effect of Earth's rotation on the direction of winds and currents (clockwise in Northern Hemisphere and counterclockwise in Southern Hemisphere)

Trade winds

Winds that blow northeast from 30 degrees north and south latitude

Prevailing westerlies

winds that blow west to east between 30 and 60 degrees north/south

polar easterlies

the surface winds that occur between the north/south pole and 60 degrees north/south latitude

*What is the most important current affecting the United States and its entire Atlantic seaboard?

Gulf Stream

What is in the center of the Gulf Stream?

The Sargasso Sea

North Equatorial Current

Carries warmer waters northwestward along the West Indies on the eastern rim of the Caribbean Sea

Hurricanes

Severe storms with winds greater than 75 mph

Kuroshio Current

Flows northwestward from Japan's Ryukyu Islands

*What are hurricanes called in the Pacific Ocean?

typhoons

What are the two branches of the Kuroshio Current?

Alaskan Current and California Current

Spring tide

a tide just after a new or full moon, when there is the greatest difference between high and low water.

Supernova

A gigantic explosion in which a massive star collapses and throws its outer layers into space

neap tide

the tide with the least difference between consecutive low and high tides

Planetary nebula

A huge cloud of gas that is created when the outer layers of a red giant star drift out into space

Ebb tide

a falling or lowering tide

White dwarf

the blue-white hot core of a star that is left behind after its outer layers have expanded and drifted out into space

Flood tide

incoming or rising tide

dwarf planet

a celestial body resembling a small planet but lacking certain technical criteria that are required for it to be classed as such.

What country created the world's first successful large-scale tidal power plant?

France (La Rance, 1966)

Orbital period

the time required for a body to complete a single orbit

Upwelling

the upward movement of ocean water toward the surface as a result of diverging currents

What are the Big Four planets?

Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn

Callao Painter

Hydrogen sulfide from decaying fish and birds that paints ship's hulls black on the coasts of Peru and Chile

What planets do not have any moons?

Venus and Mercury

El Nino

A warm ocean current that flows along the coast of Peru every seven to fourteen years

What is the largest volcano on Mars?

Olympus Mons

La Nina

A cooling of the ocean surface off the western coast of South America, occurring periodically every 4 to 12 years and affecting Pacific and other weather patterns.

What are the two moons of Mars?

Phobos and Deimos

Red Tide

a population explosion of certain marine dinoflagellates that causes the water to turn a red or red-brown color and to contain poisonous alkaloids produced by the dinoflagellates

What are the two moons of Saturn?

Titan and Enceladus

What are the largest form of zooplankton?

Jellyfish

What are the four moons of Jupiter?

Io, Europa, Ganymede, Callisto

What are the two types of jawless fish?

hagfish and lampreys

Great Red Spot

a giant, high-pressure continuous storm on Jupiter

*Aquaculture

the farming of aquatic animals

Who discovered Uranus?

William Herschel in 1781

What are the four sources of natural light?

Mineral phosphorus, radioactive minerals, cool gases, and bioluminescence

Trojans

Asteroids that share an orbit with Neptune, Jupiter, and Mars

*What does SCUBA stand for?

self-contained underwater breathing apparatus

near-earth asteroids

A group of asteroids located between Mars and Earth