Natural Environment
A branch of the warm Kuroshio Current warms the bay, allowing it to host marine organisms typical of more southerly regions and giving a mild climate to the land bordering the bay. The maximum depth of the bay is about 1500 meters.
Organisms from sub-arctic regions are also advected into the bay by intrusions of the Oyashio Current resulting in a very high biodiversity. It is the major study site for research programs at the University of Tokyo (ORI) and the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC).
In 2004, soil samples from the bay were found to contain radioactive contamination from the Bikini Atoll nuclear tests that took place from 1946 to 1958.
Read more about this topic: Sagami Bay
Famous quotes containing the words natural and/or environment:
“Doubtless, we are as slow to conceive of Paradise as of Heaven, of a perfect natural as of a perfect spiritual world. We see how past ages have loitered and erred. Is perhaps our generation free from irrationality and error? Have we perhaps reached now the summit of human wisdom, and need no more to look out for mental or physical improvement? Undoubtedly, we are never so visionary as to be prepared for what the next hour may bring forth.”
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