San Pedro Bay is an inlet on the
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, 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 ...
coast of
Southern California
Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural List of regions of California, region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Its densely populated coastal reg ...
, United States. It is the site of the
Port of Los Angeles
The Port of Los Angeles is a seaport managed by the Los Angeles Harbor Department, a unit of the Los Angeles, City of Los Angeles. It occupies of land and water with of waterfront and adjoins the separate Port of Long Beach. Promoted as "Amer ...
and the
Port of Long Beach
The Port of Long Beach, administered as the Harbor Department of the City of Long Beach, is a container port in the United States, which adjoins Port of Los Angeles. Acting as a major gateway for US–Asian trade, the port occupies of land wi ...
, which together form the fifth-busiest
port
A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Hamburg, Manch ...
facility in the world (behind the ports of
Shanghai
Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...
,
Singapore
Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...
,
Hong Kong
Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...
, and
Shenzhen
Shenzhen is a prefecture-level city in the province of Guangdong, China. A Special economic zones of China, special economic zone, it is located on the east bank of the Pearl River (China), Pearl River estuary on the central coast of Guangdong ...
) and the busiest in the Americas. The Los Angeles community of
San Pedro borders a small portion of the western side of the bay. The city of
Long Beach
Long Beach is a coastal city in southeastern Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is the list of United States cities by population, 44th-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 451,307 as of 2022. A charter ci ...
borders the port on the eastern side of the bay. The northern part of the bay, which is the largest part of the port, is bordered by the Los Angeles neighborhood of
Wilmington.
Seabed
Most of the bay is between deep. The seabed near Long Beach has experienced considerable
subsidence
Subsidence is a general term for downward vertical movement of the Earth's surface, which can be caused by both natural processes and human activities. Subsidence involves little or no horizontal movement, which distinguishes it from slope mov ...
as a result of oil extraction in the
Wilmington Field from the 1950s onward. This helped the Port of Long Beach surpass the Port of Los Angeles as the leading port in the United States for a time in the 1980s and 1990s, since the deeper seafloor meant that Long Beach could accommodate ships with deeper drafts than could Los Angeles. Dredging operations related to the construction of a gigantic new marine terminal at the Port of Los Angeles have since made both sides of the bay accessible to even the largest existing
container ship
A container ship (also called boxship or spelled containership) is a cargo ship that carries all of its load in truck-size intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. Container ships are a common means of commercial intermodal ...
s. Concerns regarding subsidence increased until Operation "Big Squirt", a water injection program, halted any progression of sinking land in 1960.
Islands
Natural islands in San Pedro Bay include
Terminal Island
Terminal Island, historically known as , is a largely artificial island located in Los Angeles County, California, between the neighborhoods of Wilmington, Los Angeles, Wilmington and San Pedro, Los Angeles, San Pedro in the city of Los Angeles ...
(actually an augmented
mudflat
Mudflats or mud flats, also known as tidal flats or, in Ireland, slob or slobs, are coastal wetlands that form in intertidal areas where sediments have been deposited by tides or rivers. A global analysis published in 2019 suggested that tidal ...
and Rattlesnake Island), the site of much of Los Angeles' and Long Beach's port facilities,
Mormon Island, the site of an abortive settlement attempt by
San Bernardino
San Bernardino ( ) is a city in and the county seat of San Bernardino County, California, United States. Located in the Inland Empire region of Southern California, the city had a population of 222,101 in the 2020 census, making it the List of ...
-based Mormon pioneers in the 1850s, and Smith's Island.
Land reclamation
Land reclamation, often known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new Terrestrial ecoregion, land from oceans, list of seas, seas, Stream bed, riverbeds or lake ...
operations by Los Angeles have considerably enlarged Terminal Island, as well as linking Mormon Island to the mainland.
Deadman's Island sat at a landmark at the foot of the bay, but was removed in 1928 as part of the effort by
Phineas Banning
Phineas Banning (August 19, 1830 – March 8, 1885) was an American businessperson, businessman, financier and entrepreneur.
Known as "The Father of the Port of Los Angeles," he was one of the founders of the town of Wilmington, Los Angeles, Ca ...
to enlarge the harbor. In 1927 an airport, originally called
Allen Field and later
Naval Air Station Terminal Island, was built on San Pedro's Terminal Island.
Four small artificial islands containing
oil well
An oil well is a drillhole boring in Earth that is designed to bring petroleum oil hydrocarbons to the surface. Usually some natural gas is released as associated petroleum gas along with the oil. A well that is designed to produce only gas m ...
s (the
THUMS Islands) are scattered around the bay near Long Beach. The oil drilling equipment itself is masked by tropical landscaping, architectural features and fake high-rise "buildings" in an attempt to improve their appearance from shore. These islands, named Oil Islands Freeman, Grissom, White, and Chaffee, are named for
Theodore Freeman, the first
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...
astronaut
An astronaut (from the Ancient Greek (), meaning 'star', and (), meaning 'sailor') is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a List of human spaceflight programs, human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member of a spa ...
to die during flight, and for
Gus Grissom
Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom (April 3, 1926 – January 27, 1967) was an American engineer and pilot in the United States Air Force, as well as one of the original Mercury Seven selected by the NASA, National Aeronautics and Space Administration fo ...
,
Ed White, and
Roger B. Chaffee, who were killed by a fire during the
Apollo 1
Apollo 1, initially designated AS-204, was planned to be the first crewed mission of the Apollo program, the American undertaking to land the first man on the Moon. It was planned to launch on February 21, 1967, as the first low Earth orbital ...
mission.
Free Harbor Fight
As Los Angeles developed as an economic and trading hub, the need for a deep harbor became apparent. In the late 1890s, the
Southern Pacific Railroad
The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials) was an American Railroad classes#Class I, Class I Rail transport, railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was oper ...
started purchasing large parcels of land in
Santa Monica
Santa Monica (; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Santa Mónica'') is a city in Los Angeles County, California, Los Angeles County, situated along Santa Monica Bay on California's South Coast (California), South Coast. Santa Monica's 2020 United Sta ...
near its terminus, and the Huntington family advocated for a Santa Monica harbor, which would have monopolized Southern Pacific freight. In opposition, the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce and a newly formed Harbor League advocated for a harbor to be built in San Pedro, where the Southern Pacific would have competition with Phineas Banning's Los Angeles and Harbor Railroad. The resulting
Free Harbor Fight and 1906 annexation of the Harbor Gateway ensured Wilmington and San Pedro would serve as the main port of Los Angeles. It also explains the considerable distance between the harbor and the city's main rail yards, a situation not addressed until the construction of the
Alameda Corridor nearly a century later.
Breakwaters
Three
breakwaters
A breakwater is a permanent structure constructed at a coastal area to protect against tides, currents, waves, and storm surges. Breakwaters have been built since antiquity to protect anchorages, helping isolate vessels from marine hazards ...
extend across most of the bay, with two openings to allow ships to enter the Port of Los Angeles and the Port of Long Beach. The first section of the San Pedro Breakwater was constructed between 1899 and 1911 at
San Pedro. The
Rivers and Harbors Act
Rivers and Harbors Act may refer to one of many pieces of legislation and appropriations passed by the United States Congress since the first such legislation in 1824. At that time Congress appropriated $75,000 to improve navigation on the Ohio an ...
of 1930 authorized further construction.
The middle breakwater began construction in 1932.
The 2.5-mile eastern breakwater, also known as the
Long Beach
Long Beach is a coastal city in southeastern Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is the list of United States cities by population, 44th-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 451,307 as of 2022. A charter ci ...
Breakwater, was constructed between 1941 and 1949.

The western and middle breakwaters provided the ports considerable protection in the
1939 California tropical storm
The 1939 California tropical storm, also known as the 1939 Long Beach tropical storm, and El Cordonazo (referring to the Cordonazo winds or the "Lash of St. Francis" ()), was a tropical cyclone that affected Southern California in September 1939 ...
. With the eastern breakwater not yet constructed, coastal neighborhoods of Long Beach such as
Belmont Shore were severely impacted.
Restoration
The Long Beach breakwater is the target of controversy within the harbor towns and
Greater Los Angeles
Greater Los Angeles is the most populous metropolitan area in the U.S. state of California, encompassing five counties in Southern California extending from Ventura County in the west to San Bernardino County and Riverside County in the eas ...
conservationist community, with various environmental groups, including the Long Beach chapter of the
Surfrider Foundation
The Surfrider Foundation is a U.S. 501(c)(3) non-profit environmental organization that works to protect and preserve the world's oceans, waves and beaches. It focuses on plastic reduction, water quality, beach access, beach and surf spot preser ...
, proposing modifying or removing the breakwater to promote better water flows and a more natural coastal environment at the mouth of the
Los Angeles River
The Los Angeles River (), historically known as by the Tongva and the by the Spanish, is a major river in Los Angeles County, California. Its headwaters are in the Simi Hills and Santa Susana Mountains, and it flows nearly from Canoga Park ...
. This
restoration ecology
Ecological restoration, or ecosystem restoration, is the process of assisting the recovery of an ecosystem that has been degraded, damaged, destroyed or transformed. It is distinct from Conservation movement, conservation in that it attempts t ...
-based removal is opposed by waterfront property owners and shippers, who consider that the breakwater provides needed protection from storm damage.
A short documentary addressing the issues surrounding the reconfiguration of the Long Beach breakwater is available.
In Popular Culture
British hard rock band
Def Leppard
Def Leppard are an English Rock music, rock band formed in Sheffield in 1977. Since 1992, the band has consisted of Rick Savage (bass, backing vocals), Joe Elliott (lead vocals), Rick Allen (drummer), Rick Allen (drums), Phil Collen (guitar, ...
who were inducted into the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (RRHOF), also simply referred to as the Rock Hall, is a museum and hall of fame located in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, United States, on the shore of Lake Erie. The museum documents the history of rock music and the ...
in 2019 make specific mention of San Pedro Bay in the song ''
Hello Americaoff their 1980 debut album, ''
On Through the Night
''On Through the Night'' is the debut studio album by English rock band Def Leppard, released on 14 March 1980. The album was produced by Tom Allom. It charted at No. 15 on the UK Albums Chart and No. 51 on the ''Billboard'' 200. The album feat ...
'', singing "Well, I'm taking me a trip I'm going down to California. Yeah, I'm going to try Hollywood and San Pedro Bay" in the first verse. The
Sheffield
Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, situated south of Leeds and east of Manchester. The city is the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire and some of its so ...
based band had not been to the United States yet when the song was written.
See also
*
Port of Los Angeles
The Port of Los Angeles is a seaport managed by the Los Angeles Harbor Department, a unit of the Los Angeles, City of Los Angeles. It occupies of land and water with of waterfront and adjoins the separate Port of Long Beach. Promoted as "Amer ...
*
Terminal Island
Terminal Island, historically known as , is a largely artificial island located in Los Angeles County, California, between the neighborhoods of Wilmington, Los Angeles, Wilmington and San Pedro, Los Angeles, San Pedro in the city of Los Angeles ...
*
Long Wharf (Santa Monica)
*
Los Angeles Harbor Light
*
Long Beach Light
*
Dominguez Channel
References
Further reading
*
{{Authority control
Bays of California
Ports and harbors of California
Bodies of water of Los Angeles County, California
Bodies of water of Orange County, California
Los Angeles Harbor Region
San Pedro, Los Angeles
Geography of Los Angeles
Geography of Los Angeles County, California
Geography of Long Beach, California
History of Los Angeles
History of Long Beach, California
Terminal Island