Mount_Fuji_and_Ashitaka_Mountains_from_Satta_Pass

Suruga Bay (駿河湾, ''Suruga-wan'') is a bay on 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 ...

coast of

Honshū , historically known as , is the largest of the four main islands of Japan. It lies between the Pacific Ocean (east) and the Sea of Japan (west). It is the seventh-largest island in the world, and the second-most populous after the Indonesian ...

Shizuoka Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region of Honshu. Shizuoka Prefecture has a population of 3,555,818 and has a geographic area of . Shizuoka Prefecture borders Kanagawa Prefecture to the east, Yamanashi Pref ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. It is situated north of a straight line from Omaezaki Point to Irōzaki Point at the tip of the

Izu Peninsula The is a mountainous peninsula with a deeply indented coastline to the west of Tokyo on the Pacific Ocean, Pacific coast of the island of Honshu, Japan, the largest of the four main islands of Japan. Formerly known as Izu Province, Izu peninsu ...

and surrounded by Honshū to the southwest and west and the Izu Peninsula to the east.

Geology

Suruga Bay is a place of contrasts. Japan's loftiest peak,

Mount Fuji is an active stratovolcano located on the Japanese island of Honshu, with a summit elevation of . It is the highest mountain in Japan, the second-highest volcano on any Asian island (after Mount Kerinci on the Indonesian island of Sumatra), a ...

at , rises from the depth of the Suruga Trough running up the middle of the bay, which makes it Japan's deepest. Numerous rivers—especially the major Fuji, the Ōi, and Abe rivers—empty into its western portion, giving that area of the bay a seabed rich in

submarine canyon A submarine canyon is a steep-sided valley cut into the seabed of the continental slope, sometimes extending well onto the continental shelf, having nearly vertical walls, and occasionally having canyon wall heights of up to , from canyon flo ...

s and other geographical features, whereas at the bay's easternmost end, only the Kano River empties into a pocket called Uchiura-wan at Numazu, Shizuoka, where the

connects to

Honshu , historically known as , is the largest of the four main islands of Japan. It lies between the Pacific Ocean (east) and the Sea of Japan (west). It is the list of islands by area, seventh-largest island in the world, and the list of islands by ...

, giving the water greater transparency and leaving the seabed largely flat except for a number of small rocky islands, some joined to the mainland by

tombolo A tombolo is a sandy or shingle isthmus. It is a deposition landform by which an island becomes attached to the mainland by a narrow piece of land such as a spit or bar. Once attached, the island is then known as a tied island. The word ''t ...

s. This seabed variety coincides with coastline differences as well: The western and central sections of the Suruga Bay coastline, roughly from Shizuoka to Numazu, are characterized by sandy beaches such as those at Yuigahama and Tagonoura, whereas the eastern and northeastern stretches from Numazu down the southwestern coast of the Izu Peninsula to Irōzaki, are generally rocky.The bay is open to the

Philippine Sea The Philippine Sea is a List of seas#Marginal seas by ocean, marginal sea of the Pacific Ocean, Western Pacific Ocean east of the list of islands of the Philippines, Philippine Archipelago (hence the name) and the List of seas#Largest seas ...

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 ...

to the south, but is mostly protected from oceanic waves by Izu Peninsula. This, coupled with the seabed and water characteristics mentioned above, results in conditions favorable to fishing, sailing, windsurfing, swimming, and research on deep-sea organisms. An undersea plateau at the bay's southwest end, known as Senoumi, is especially well known as a rich fishing ground. Suruga Bay was formed by

tectonic Tectonics ( via Latin ) are the processes that result in the structure and properties of the Earth's crust and its evolution through time. The field of ''planetary tectonics'' extends the concept to other planets and moons. These processes ...

subduction Subduction is a geological process in which the oceanic lithosphere and some continental lithosphere is recycled into the Earth's mantle at the convergent boundaries between tectonic plates. Where one tectonic plate converges with a second p ...

of the

Philippine Sea Plate The Philippine Sea plate or the Philippine plate is a tectonic plate comprising oceanic lithosphere that lies beneath the Philippine Sea, to the east of the Philippines. Most segments of the Philippines, including northern Luzon, are part of ...

and the Eurasian Plate at the Suruga Trough, making it a source of considerable

seismic activity An earthquakealso called a quake, tremor, or tembloris the shaking of the Earth's surface resulting from a sudden release of energy in the lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from those so weak they ...

, and giving the bay its extreme depth.

Environmental pollution

Ever since the post-war industrial boom of Japan, the bay has suffered from severe industrial pollution. By 1970, local paper mills produced so much that the small city of Fuji (1970 pop. 180,000) produced of waste water every day – equivalent to the daily sewage of Tokyo at the time (1970 pop. 9 million). The sulphur-laden sludge was so thick that it threatened to block the harbour, requiring dredging that severely damaged the marine life. Protests from local citizens and fishermen in the area put pressure on the government to take action. Despite subsequent regulations, surveys of local sea life in the mid-2010s continue to show intense PCB and PBDE contamination. The pollution of Suruga Bay became so infamous that it featured in the 1971 film ''

Godzilla vs. Hedorah is a 1971 Japanese ''kaiju'' film directed and co-written by Yoshimitsu Banno, with special effects by Teruyoshi Nakano. Produced and distributed by Toho, Toho Co., Ltd., it is the 11th film in the Godzilla (franchise), ''Godzilla'' franchise and ...

''. The name of the titular monster is derived from ''hedoro'', the Japanese word for 'mud', and the creature fed off heavy pollution in the bay.

Transport

Suruga Bay can be reached by car from

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

via Numazu in two to five hours depending on traffic conditions on the Tōmei Expressway or in Numazu.

References

External links

{{Authority control Bays of Japan Landforms of Shizuoka Prefecture