Spillane Fjord is a

fjord In physical geography, a fjord (also spelled fiord in New Zealand English; ) is a long, narrow sea inlet with steep sides or cliffs, created by a glacier. Fjords exist on the coasts of Antarctica, the Arctic, and surrounding landmasses of the n ...

in front of

Crane Glacier Crane Glacier () is a narrow glacier which flows in an east-northeasterly direction along the northwest side of Aristotle Mountains to enter Spillane Fjord south of Devetaki Peak, on the east coast of the Antarctic Peninsula. Sir Hubert Wilkin ...

in the western part of

Exasperation Inlet Exasperation Inlet is a large ice-filled inlet, wide at its entrance between Foyn Point and Cape Disappointment, on the east coast of Graham Land. It was charted in 1947 by the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey, who so named it because the ...

Oscar II Coast Oscar II Coast is that portion of the east coast of the Antarctic Peninsula between Cape Fairweather to the north, and Cape Alexander to the south. Discovered in 1893 by Captain C.A. Larsen, who named it for King Oscar II of Norway and Sweden. ...

Graham Land Graham Land is the portion of the Antarctic Peninsula that lies north of a line joining Cape Jeremy and Cape Agassiz. This description of Graham Land is consistent with the 1964 agreement between the British Antarctic Place-names Committee ...

, entered between Caution Point and Delusion Point. The feature is 2 miles wide, 10 miles long and averages 1000 m deep. Its greatest depth is 1250 m at the far west end of the fjord. The fjord was created by the catastrophic retreat of Crane Glacier, which was itself caused by the breakup of the north portion of the

Larsen Ice Shelf The Larsen Ice Shelf is a long ice shelf in the northwest part of the Weddell Sea, extending along the east coast of the Antarctic Peninsula from Cape Longing to Smith Peninsula. It is named after Captain Carl Anton Larsen, the master of the ...

in March, 2002. The fjord's creation was documented by satellite images and the feature was first visited by surface ship in April 2006 during the

U.S. Antarctic Program The United States Antarctic Program (or USAP; formerly known as the United States Antarctic Research Program or USARP and the United States Antarctic Service or USAS) is an organization of the United States government which has a presence in the ...

NBP06-03 cruise, when the extent, depth and dimension were determined by swath bathymetry. Named by

US-ACAN The Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names (ACAN or US-ACAN) is an advisory committee of the United States Board on Geographic Names responsible for recommending commemorative names for features in Antarctica. History The committee was established ...

in 2007 after Joshua Spillane who served the USAP as a marine technician aboard L.M. Gould and N.B. Palmer. He lost his life in

Drake Passage The Drake Passage is the body of water between South America's Cape Horn, Chile, Argentina, and the South Shetland Islands of Antarctica. It connects the southwestern part of the Atlantic Ocean (Scotia Sea) with the southeastern part of the Pa ...

, April 16, 2006, while L.M. Gould was transiting from

Palmer Station Palmer Station is a United States research station in Antarctica located on Anvers island (aka Antwerp Island), the only U.S. station on the continent located north of the Antarctic Circle. The first Palmer was built in 1965, but the current sit ...

Punta Arenas Punta Arenas (, historically known as Sandy Point in English) is the capital List of cities in Chile, city of Chile's southernmost Regions of Chile, region, Magallanes Region, Magallanes and Antarctica Chilena. Although officially renamed as ...

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 ...

Location

Spillane Fjord is located at . Antarctic Digital Database mapping in 2012.

Maps

Antarctic Digital Database (ADD).
Scale 1:250000 topographic map of Antarctica. Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR), 1993–2016.

References

Spillane Fjord.

SCAR A scar (or scar tissue) is an area of fibrosis, fibrous tissue that replaces normal skin after an injury. Scars result from the biological process of wound repair in the skin, as well as in other Organ (anatomy), organs, and biological tissue, t ...

Composite Antarctic Gazetteer The Composite Gazetteer of Antarctica (CGA) of the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) is the authoritative international gazetteer containing all Antarctic toponyms published in national gazetteers, plus basic information about th ...

. Bays of Graham Land Oscar II Coast {{OscarIICoast-geo-stub