Timor Sea

The Timor Sea (, , or ) is a relatively shallow sea in the Indian Ocean bounded to the north by the island of Timor with Timor-Leste to the north, Indonesia to the northwest, Arafura Sea to the east, and to the south by Australia. The Sunda Trench marks the deepest point of the Timor Sea with a depth of more than 3300 metres, separating the continents of Oceania in the southeast and Asia to the northwest and north. The Timor sea is prone to earthquakes and tsunamis north of the Sunda Trench, due to its location on the Ring of Fire as well as volcanic activity and can experience major cyclones, due to the proximity from the Equator.

The sea contains a number of reefs, uninhabited islands and significant hydrocarbon reserves. International disputes emerged after the reserves were discovered resulting in the signing of the Timor Sea Treaty.

The Timor Sea was hit by the worst oil spill for 25 years in 2009.

It is possible that Australia's first inhabitants crossed the Timor Sea from the Malay Archipelago at a time when sea levels were lower.

Etymology

The Timor Sea is named after Timor, the island on the other side of the sea's northern coastline. The island's name is a variant of , Malay for "east".

In Tetum, the sea is often referred to by the expression (). The counterpart of that body of water, the ' Ombai- Wetar Strait', which has smaller waves, is less turbid, and washes most of Timor island's northern shores, is commonly referred to in Tetum as ().

Geography

The waters to the east are known as the Arafura Sea. The Timor Sea is adjacent to three substantial inlets on the north Australian coast, the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf, Beagle Gulf and the Van Diemen Gulf. The Australian city of Darwin which is located in part on the shore of the Beagle Gulf, is the nearest large city to the sea. The small town of Wyndham is located on the west arm of Cambridge Gulf, an inlet of Joseph Bonaparte Gulf.

Rivers that enter the Timor Sea from the Northern Territory include Fish River, King River, Dry River, Victoria River and the Alligator Rivers. Rivers in the Kimberley region that flows into the Timor Sea include the Ord River, Forrest River, Pentecost River and Durack River.

The sea is about wide, covering an area of about . Its deepest point is the Timor Trough (which some geologists consider to be the south-eastern extension of the Java Trench, but others view it as a foreland trough to the Timor Island "mountain range"), located in the northern part of the sea, which reaches a depth of . The remainder of the sea is much shallower, much of it averaging less than deep, as it overlies the Sahul Shelf, part of the Australian continental shelf.

The Big Bank Shoals is an area on the sloping seabed between the continental shelf and the Timor Trough where a number of submerged banks are located. The ecosystem of the shoals differs significantly from the deeper waters surrounding them. In May 2010, it was announced that a crater about wide has been discovered on the seabed of the Timor Sea.

Extent

The International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) defines the Timor Sea as being one of the waters of the East Indian Archipelago. The IHO defines its limits as follows:

''On the North'' The Southeastern limit of the Savu Sea Timor to the Northeast point of Rote Island">Roti