Category Geography

Where does Samoa located?

               The Independent State of Samoa (formerly known as Western Samoa) is located south of the equator, in the Polynesian region of the Pacific Ocean, about halfway between Hawaii and New Zealand.

               Samoa consists of two main islands Upolu and Savai’i and seven smaller islets.

               Upolu is where Samoa’s capital city Apia is located and home to nearly three-quarters of Samoa’s total population.

               The Lapita people discovered and settled the Samoan Islands around 3,500 years ago. They developed a unique Samoan language and Samoan cultural identity. Samoans consists of about 92.6 per cent of the total population.

               The Samoans are the second-largest branch of the Polynesians, a people occupying the scattered islands of the Pacific from Hawaii to New Zealand and from eastern Fiji to Easter Island.

              Most of the remaining Samoans are of mixed Samoan and European or Asian descent.

              The Independent State of Samoa’s currency is Tala. Samoan and English are the official languages.

What makes Cabo Verde a significant country?

 

            Cabo Verde, or Cape Verde, an island nation on an archipelago of volcanic origin in the Atlantic Ocean, approximately 570 kilometres off the north-western coast of Africa, about 600 km west of Senegal.

            The Republic of Cape Verde was uninhabited until the 15th century, when Portuguese explorers discovered and colonized the islands, establishing the first European settlement in the tropics. Cape Verde subsequently became a trading centre for African slaves and later an important coaling and resupply stop for whaling and transatlantic shipping.

            The country got its independence in 1975. Since the early 1990s, Cape Verde has been a stable representative democracy, and remains one of the most developed and democratic countries in Africa. The capital and largest city is Praia.

Where is Trinidad and Tobago located?

            Trinidad and Tobago is an island country in the southeastern West Indies. It consists of two main islands: Trinidad and Tobago and several smaller islands.

            Trinidad and Tobago is one of the wealthiest countries in the Caribbean. It has large reserves of oil and gas. Many European powers colonized this island nation. Trinidad and Tobago became an independent state in 1962, after gaining its sovereignty from the United Kingdom.

            The capital of Trinidad and Tobago is Port of Spain, located on the north western coast of Trinidad. The currency of Trinidad and Tobago is the Trinidad and Tobago dollar. It is recognized by the World Bank as a high-income economy. Unlike most of the English-speaking Caribbean, the country’s economy is primarily industrial. The language spoken is English along with many vernaculars. Cricket is the national sport of the country.

 

 

Ice and Snow

 

Where does most snow fall?

Snow can fall wherever the weather is very cold, and it falls throughout the year in the Arctic and Antarctic.

Most snow falls in temperate climates during the winter, especially in the Alps in Italy and Switzerland and in the Rocky Mountains in the USA. In fact, almost every mountain range is associated with heavy snowfalls. Snow can even fall on the Equator on mountains more than 4,880 m high, where the air is very cold. 

Picture credit: google

 

 

 

 

 

How thick is the ice at the South Pole?

The thickest ice at the South Pole is 4,800 m deep — that’s ten times the height of a tall skyscraper. The ice covers a huge area of 14 million sq km, which is bigger than the whole of Europe. However, the land area under the ice is much smaller because the ice sheet extends out over the sea. Antarctica contains 90 percent of all the ice on the Earth. Scientists have calculated that should all this ice melt sea levels would rise by 60 m causing world-wide flooding.

Picture credit: google

 

Ice and Snow

How does frost break up rocks?

Frost can shatter rocks, making it one of the most important causes of erosion in cold regions. Water seeps into small cracks in rocks and freezes at night, when frost appears. As water freezes it expands slightly, opening up cracks in the rock until parts of it flake away. This process continues until large masses of rock are broken up. It is the cause of the piles of shattered rock, or scree that are commonly found at the foot of mountains. You can see the same process at work when a clay flowerpot left in the garden in winter begins to flake and crack. 

Picture credit: google

 

 

 

Why do icebergs float?

Ice floats because it is lighter than water. Most objects shrink when they get cold, but when water freezes it expands slightly. In this way ice becomes lighter than water. It is only slightly lighter however, and so nine-tenths of a floating iceberg lies under the water. 

Picture credit: google

Ice and Snow

 

Frozen

Glaciers and ice sheets sometimes give up their secrets centuries later. Thawing ice has revealed the bodies of people who fell into crevasses hundreds of years ago. The ice has preserved their clothes and their internal organs. Even more astonishing are the bodies of mammoths found occasionally in the permafrost under Alaska and Siberia. Scientists are trying to extract their DNA so they can study these extinct beasts in minute detail. 

Picture credit: google

 

 

 

 

How big are icebergs?

Some icebergs are bigger than an entire country. The biggest iceberg ever recorded was larger than Belgium, with an area of 31,000 sq km. These giant icebergs break away from the polar ice sheets when the rise and fall of the tide crack the ice. 

Picture credit: google