Coronation Gulf lies between

Victoria Island Victoria Island ( ikt, Kitlineq, italic=yes) is a large island in the Arctic Archipelago that straddles the boundary between Nunavut and the Northwest Territories of Canada. It is the eighth-largest island in the world, and at in area, it is ...

and mainland

Nunavut Nunavut ( , ; iu, ᓄᓇᕗᑦ , ; ) is the largest and northernmost territory of Canada. It was separated officially from the Northwest Territories on April 1, 1999, via the '' Nunavut Act'' and the '' Nunavut Land Claims Agreement Act'' ...

in Canada. To the northwest it connects with

Dolphin and Union Strait Dolphin and Union Strait lies in both the Northwest Territories ( Inuvik Region) and Nunavut ( Kitikmeot Region), Canada, between the mainland and Victoria Island. It is part of the Northwest Passage. It links Amundsen Gulf, lying to the northwe ...

and thence the

Beaufort Sea The Beaufort Sea (; french: Mer de Beaufort, Iñupiaq: ''Taġiuq'') is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean, located north of the Northwest Territories, the Yukon, and Alaska, and west of Canada's Arctic islands. The sea is named after Sir ...

and

Arctic Ocean The Arctic Ocean is the smallest and shallowest of the world's five major oceans. It spans an area of approximately and is known as the coldest of all the oceans. The International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) recognizes it as an ocean, a ...

; to the northeast it connects with

Dease Strait Dease Strait is an east–west waterway between the mainland's Kent Peninsula and Victoria Island in Nunavut, Canada. It is part of the Northwest Passage. At its eastern end, approximately wide, is Cambridge Bay; to the west it widens to approxi ...

and thence

Queen Maud Gulf Queen or QUEEN may refer to: Monarchy * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom ** List of queens regnant * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mothe ...

. The northwest point is Cape Krusenstern (not the

Cape Krusenstern Cape Krusenstern is a cape on the northwestern coast of the U.S. state of Alaska, located near the village of Kivalina at . It is bounded by Kotzebue Sound to the south and the Chukchi Sea to the west, and consists of a series of beach ridges ...

Alaska Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U ...

). South of that is Richardson Bay and the mouths (from west to east) of the

Rae River The Rae River (Pallirk) is a waterway that flows from Akuliakattak Lake into Richardson Bay, Coronation Gulf. Its mouth is situated northwest of Kugluktuk, Nunavut. Its shores were the ancestral home of Copper Inuit subgroups: the Kanianermiut (a ...

, Richardson River and the large

Coppermine River The Coppermine River is a river in the North Slave and Kitikmeot regions of the Northwest Territories and Nunavut in Canada. It is long. It rises in Lac de Gras, a small lake near Great Slave Lake, and flows generally north to Coronation Gul ...

, Napaaktoktok River, and the Asiak River. The Tree River enters at the south center. At the southeast end is the large

Bathurst Inlet Bathurst Inlet, officially Kiluhiqtuq, is a deep inlet located along the northern coast of the Canadian mainland, at the east end of Coronation Gulf, into which the Burnside and Western rivers empty. The name, or its native equivalent ''Kingo ...

. At the northeast end is Cape Flinders on the

Kent Peninsula Kiillinnguyaq, formerly the Kent Peninsula, is a large Arctic peninsula, almost totally surrounded by water, in the Kitikmeot Region of Nunavut. Were it not for a isthmus at the southeast corner it would be a long island parallel to the coast. F ...

. In the center of the gulf lies the

Duke of York Archipelago The Duke of York Archipelago is an uninhabited island group in the Kitikmeot Region, Nunavut, Canada. It is located in the Coronation Gulf. The archipelago is composed of the islands of Akvitlak Islands, Anchor Island, Bate Islands, Hatoayok ...

. The gulf was named by Sir

John Franklin Sir John Franklin (16 April 1786 – 11 June 1847) was a British Royal Navy officer and Arctic explorer. After serving in wars against Napoleonic France and the United States, he led two expeditions into the Canadian Arctic and through t ...

in 1821, in honour of the coronation of King George IV. The environment and Native culture of the area were studied by Rudolph Anderson and

Diamond Jenness Diamond Jenness, (February 10, 1886, Wellington, New Zealand – November 29, 1969, Chelsea, Quebec, Canada) was one of Canada's greatest early scientists and a pioneer of Canadian anthropology. Early life (1886–1910) Family and childho ...

in 1916 as part of the Canadian Arctic Expedition. The mainland south of the gulf may have substantial

diamond Diamond is a solid form of the element carbon with its atoms arranged in a crystal structure called diamond cubic. Another solid form of carbon known as graphite is the chemically stable form of carbon at room temperature and pressure, ...

and

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

deposits. In 2010, the Coronation Gulf was the site of maritime disaster, when the ''Clipper Adventurer'' ran aground on a rock shoal. The accident punctured the ship's ballast and fuel tanks, releasing pollution into the pristine waters, and stranded 128 passengers and 69 crew members until the CCGS ''Amundsen'' came to rescue them.

References

Gulfs of Kitikmeot Region Gulfs of the Arctic Ocean Victoria Island (Canada) {{KitikmeotNU-geo-stub