Elphinstone Reef (also known as Sha'ab Abu Hamra) is a standalone

reef A reef is a ridge or shoal of rock, coral, or similar relatively stable material lying beneath the surface of a natural body of water. Many reefs result from natural, abiotic component, abiotic (non-living) processes such as deposition (geol ...

in the

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

ian

Red Sea The Red Sea is a sea inlet of the Indian Ocean, lying between Africa and Asia. Its connection to the ocean is in the south, through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait and the Gulf of Aden. To its north lie the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Aqaba, and th ...

situated about 30 kilometers north from the town of Marsa Alam in Egypt. The

coral Corals are colonial marine invertebrates within the subphylum Anthozoa of the phylum Cnidaria. They typically form compact Colony (biology), colonies of many identical individual polyp (zoology), polyps. Coral species include the important Coral ...

community in this reef is primarily composed of soft corals such as ''

Dendronephthya ''Dendronephthya'' is a genus of soft corals in the family Nephtheidae. There are over 250 described species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating t ...

'' species.

Gallery

File:Oceanic whitetip shark at Elphinstone Reef.jpg,

Oceanic whitetip shark The oceanic whitetip shark (''Carcharhinus longimanus'') is a large requiem shark inhabiting the pelagic zone of tropical and warm temperate seas. It has a stocky body with its iconic elongated rounded fins, with white tips. The species is ...

at Elphinstone Reef File:Elphinstone Reef soft corals.jpg,

Soft corals Octocorallia, along with Hexacorallia, is one of the two extant classes of Anthozoa. It comprises over 3,000 species of marine and brackish animals consisting of colonial polyps with 8-fold symmetry, commonly referred informally as "soft cora ...

and

Anthias Anthias are members of the family Anthiadidae in the order Perciformes. The group has also been called Anthiidae or Anthiinae, but these names are preoccupied by a subfamily of ground beetles in the family Carabidae erected by Bonelli in 1813 ...

at Elphinstone Reef File:Elphinstone Reef memorial.jpg, Memorial dedicated to

Arno Wallaard Arno Wallaard (13 October 1979 in Noordeloos – 28 February 2006 in Noordeloos) was a Dutch cyclist. He died on 28 February 2006, after feeling sick coming home from training. The cycling race Omloop Alblasserwaard, which Wallaard won in 1999, w ...

on south plato File:Hawksbill turtle at Elphinstone Reef, Red Sea, Egypt (35150034493).jpg,

Hawksbill turtle The hawksbill sea turtle (''Eretmochelys imbricata'') is a critically endangered sea turtle belonging to the family Cheloniidae. It is the only extant species in the genus ''Eretmochelys''. The species has a global distribution that is largely ...

at Elphinstone Reef]

References

{{Recreational dive sites, reesit Reefs of the Red Sea Underwater diving sites in Egypt