How large is the Pacific Ocean?

zbeckabee

The Pacific Ocean (from the Latin name Mare Pacificum, "peaceful sea", bestowed upon it by the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan) is the world's largest body of water. It encompasses a third of the Earth's surface, having an area of 179.7 million square kilometres (69.4 million sq mi)—significantly larger than Earth's entire landmass, with room for another Africa to spare. Extending approximately 15,500 kilometres (9,600 mi) from the Bering Sea in the Arctic to the icy margins of Antarctica's Ross Sea in the south (although the Antarctic regions of the Pacific are sometimes described as part of the circumpolar Southern Ocean), the Pacific reaches its greatest east-west width at about 5°N latitude, where it stretches approximately 19,800 kilometres (12,300 mi) from Indonesia to the coast of Colombia and Peru. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_ocean Jul 04 06, 12:29 PM