Beagle Channel (; Yahgan: ''Onašaga'') is a strait in the Tierra del Fuego Archipelago, on the extreme southern tip of

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

between

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...

and

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

. The channel separates the larger main island of Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego from various smaller islands including the islands of Picton, Lennox and Nueva;

Navarino Navarino or Navarin may refer to: Battle * Battle of Navarino, 1827 naval battle off Navarino, Greece, now known as Pylos Geography * Navarino is the former name of Pylos, a Greek town on the Ionian Sea, where the 1827 battle took place ** Old Na ...

; Hoste; Londonderry; and Stewart. The channel's eastern area forms part of the border between Chile and Argentina and the western area is entirely within Chile. The Beagle Channel, the

Straits of Magellan The Strait of Magellan (), also called the Straits of Magellan, is a navigable sea route in southern Chile separating mainland South America to the north and the Tierra del Fuego archipelago to the south. Considered the most important natural ...

to the north, and the open-ocean Drake Passage to the south are the three navigable passages around South America between the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is bounded by the cont ...

and

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the ...

s. The Beagle Channel is about long and wide at its narrowest point. It extends from Nueva Island in the east to Darwin Sound and Cook Bay in the Pacific Ocean in the west. Some from its western end, it divides into two branches, north and south of Gordon Island. The southwest branch between Hoste Island and Gordon Island enters Cook Bay. The northwest branch between Gordon Island and Isla Grande enters Darwin Sound, which connects to the Pacific Ocean by the O'Brien and Ballenero channels. The biggest settlement on the channel is

Ushuaia Ushuaia ( , ) is the capital city, capital of Tierra del Fuego Province, Argentina, Tierra del Fuego, Antártida e Islas del Atlántico Sur Province, Argentina. With a population of 82,615 and a location below the 54th parallel south latitude, U ...

in Argentina followed by

Puerto Williams Puerto Williams (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Port Williams") is a city, port and naval base on Navarino Island in Chile. It faces the Beagle Channel. It is the Capital city, capital of Antártica Chilena Province, the Chilean Antarctic Provin ...

in Chile. These are amongst the

southernmost settlements Southernmost settlements are cities, towns, weather stations or permanent military bases which are farther south than 45th parallel south, latitude 45°S. They are closely related to the Southern Ocean or either the Roaring Forties or Furious Fift ...

in the world.

Navigation

Although it is navigable by large ships, there are safer waters to the south ( Drake Passage) and to the north ( Strait of Magellan). Under the Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina, ships of other nations navigate with a Chilean

pilot An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person who controls the flight of an aircraft by operating its Aircraft flight control system, directional flight controls. Some other aircrew, aircrew members, such as navigators or flight engineers, are al ...

between the Strait of Magellan and

through the Magdalena Channel and the Cockburn Channel to the Pacific Ocean, then by the Ballenero Channel, the O'Brien Channel and the northwest branch of the Beagle Channel.

Islands

The Beagle Channel is between islands covering a much larger area; to the north lies Argentine-Chilean Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, to the south Hoste,

, and Picton and Nueva, which were claimed by Argentina until 1984. The latter two lie at the bi-national eastern entrance to the channel while the western entrance is wholly inside Chile. The western entrance of Beagle Channel is divided by Gordon Island into two channels. Some minor islands exist inside the channel among them Snipe Islet and Gable Island. Except for eastern Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego and Gable Island all islands mentioned here belong to Chile.

History

The Yaghan peoples settled the islands along the Murray Channel, which connects to the southern side of the Beagle Channel, approximately 10,000 years before present. There are notable

archaeological Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, ...

sites indicating such early Yaghan settlement at locations such as Bahia Wulaia on Isla Navarino, site of the ''Bahia Wulaia Dome Middens''.

Mythology

According to a Selkʼnam myth, the channel was created alongside the Strait of Magellan and Fagnano Lake in places where slingshots fell on earth during Taiyín's fight with a witch who was said to have "retained the waters and the foods".

Naming and Darwin visit

The channel was named after the ship HMS ''Beagle'' during its first hydrographic survey of the coasts of the southern part of South America which lasted from 1826 to 1830. During that expedition, under the overall command of Commander Phillip Parker King, the ''Beagle'' captain Pringle Stokes committed suicide and was replaced by captain Robert FitzRoy. The ship continued the survey in the second voyage of ''Beagle'' under the command of captain FitzRoy, who took

Charles Darwin Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English Natural history#Before 1900, naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all speci ...

along as a self-funding supernumerary, giving him opportunities as an amateur

naturalist Natural history is a domain of inquiry involving organisms, including animals, fungi, and plants, in their natural environment, leaning more towards observational than experimental methods of study. A person who studies natural history is cal ...

. Darwin had his first sight of

glacier A glacier (; or ) is a persistent body of dense ice, a form of rock, that is constantly moving downhill under its own weight. A glacier forms where the accumulation of snow exceeds its ablation over many years, often centuries. It acquires ...

s when they reached the channel on 29 January 1833, and wrote in his field notebook "It is scarcely possible to imagine anything more beautiful than the beryl-like blue of these glaciers, and especially as contrasted with the dead white of the upper expanse of snow."

Beagle conflict

Several small islands ( Picton, Lennox and Nueva) up to the

Cape Horn Cape Horn (, ) is the southernmost headland of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago of southern Chile, and is located on the small Hornos Island. Although not the most southerly point of South America (which is Águila Islet), Cape Horn marks the nor ...

were the subject of the long-running Beagle conflict between Chile and Argentina. From the 1950s to 1970s several incidents involving the Chilean and Argentine navies occurred in the waters of the Beagle Channel, for example the 1958 Snipe incident, the 1967 ''Cruz del Sur'' incident and the shelling of ''Quidora'' the same year. See List of incidents during the Beagle conflict. By the terms of a Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina the islands are now part of Chile.

Beagle Channel in the Fine Arts

As a ship's painter, Conrad Martens drew and created watercolour paintings in 1833 and 1834 during the second voyage of HMS ''Beagle'' in

Tierra del Fuego Tierra del Fuego (, ; Spanish for "Land of Fire", rarely also Fireland in English) is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South America, South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The archipelago consists of the main is ...

. The German painter Ingo Kühl traveled three times to the Beagle Channel, where he created paintings on board a sailing yacht. File:HMS Beagle by Conrad Martens.jpg, HMS ''Beagle'' at Ponsonby Sound in the Beagle Channel, by the ship's artist Conrad Martens. File: Ingo Kühl "Gletscher (Beagle Kanal)" 2005.jpg , ''Glacier (Beagle Channel)'', painted by Ingo Kühl (2005).

Fauna

Beagle Channel is a prominent area to watch rare species of dolphins. Wildlife seen in the channel include: Mammals: * South American sea lion * South American fur seal * Peale's dolphin (endemic to Patagonia) * Dusky dolphin * Commerson's dolphin * Risso's dolphin * Burmeister's porpoise * spectacled porpoise Birds: * Magellanic penguin *

southern rockhopper penguin The western rockhopper penguin (''Eudyptes chrysocome''), traditionally known as the southern rockhopper penguin, is a species of rockhopper penguin that is sometimes considered distinct from the northern rockhopper penguin. It occurs in subanta ...

* upland goose * kelp goose * crested duck * great grebe * flying steamerduck * flightless steamerduck * black-faced ibis * black-crowned night-heron * imperial shag * rock shag * Neotropic cormorant * black-chested buzzard-eagle * turkey vulture * Andean condor * crested caracara * chimango caracara * white-throated caracara * striated caracara * Magellanic oystercatcher * blackish oystercatcher * southern lapwing * rufous-chested plover * Baird's sandpiper * white-rumped sandpiper * brown-hooded gull * dolphin gull * South American tern *

kelp gull The kelp gull (''Larus dominicanus''), also known as the Dominican gull, is a gull that breeds on coasts and islands through much of the Southern Hemisphere. The nominate ''L. d. dominicanus'' is the subspecies found around South America, pa ...

* Chilean skua * Magellanic diving-petrel * common diving-petrel

Gallery

Image:beagle-canal-panorama.jpg, Beagle Channel seen from above

Image:Beagle Channel - La Isla de Los Lobos.jpg, Sea Lions Island or La Isla de Los Lobos Image:BeagleChannelGlacier.jpg, Romanche Glacier on the north shore of the channel Image:Beagle-Kanal Ushuaia.JPG, Beagle Channel, January 2006 Image:Farofindelmundo2.JPG, View of The Lighthouse Les Eclaireurs called ''End of the World'' near

on the north shore of the channel