The Flanders Banks is an array of nine sandbanks which extend off the coast of Dunkirk, France, in the south of the North Sea.
A short distance from Dunkirk lie the banks of Flanders, generally submerged less than five meters deep and separated by furrows ten to twenty meters deep. These sandbanks, also called sublittoral sandy sedimentary groups, are oriented from east-northeast to west-southwest and arranged parallel to the shore of the North Sea. They close the Dunkirk harbour, forcing ships to follow marked passages to enter or leave the port: the West Pass and the Zuydcoote Pass. It is to the north of the latter that the banks can be seen emerging at low tide. [1]
The continental base is relatively shallow in this area and the banks were formed by tidal currents. Their formation is linked to the flow gain, that is to say that the mass of materials brought by the flow is greater than that removed by the ebb. These banks can take on the appearance of real underwater dunes formed from the accumulation of shell sand, called hydraulic dunes, rising around twenty meters above the seabed. [1]
The Flanders banks are integrated into the perimeter of the Natura 2000 Bancs de Flandres site which covers a vast area of 1,132 km2 in the North sea off the coast of France. The banks are relatively poor in terms of biological diversity however the sandbanks are home to species characteristic of this type of formation such as the sand urchin . The area is notable for the presence of marine mammals, with a sedentary population of seals and episodic populations of grey seals and porpoises. [2]
Dunkirk is a commune in the department of Nord in northern France. It lies 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) from the Belgian border. It has the third-largest French harbour. The population of the commune in 2019 was 86,279.
The Strait of Dover or Dover Strait, is the strait at the narrowest part of the English Channel, marking the boundary between the Channel and the North Sea, and separating Great Britain from continental Europe. The shortest distance across the strait, at approximately 20 miles, is from the South Foreland, northeast of Dover in the English county of Kent, to Cap Gris Nez, a cape near to Calais in the French département of Pas-de-Calais. Between these points lies the most popular route for cross-channel swimmers. The entire strait is within the territorial waters of France and the United Kingdom, but a right of transit passage under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea allows vessels of other nations to move freely through the strait.
In oceanography, geomorphology, and geoscience, a shoal is a natural submerged ridge, bank, or bar that consists of, or is covered by, sand or other unconsolidated material, and rises from the bed of a body of water close to the surface or above it, which poses a danger to navigation. Shoals are also known as sandbanks, sandbars, or gravelbars. Two or more shoals that are either separated by shared troughs or interconnected by past or present sedimentary and hydrographic processes are referred to as a shoal complex.
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The Banc d'Arguin National Park of Bay of Arguin lies in Western Africa on the west coast of Mauritania between Nouakchott and Nouadhibou and is the former mouth of the Tamanrasset River. The World Heritage Site is a major site for migratory birds and breeding birds, including flamingos, pelicans and terns. Much of the breeding is on sand banks including the islands of Tidra, Niroumi, Nair, Kijji and Arguim. The surrounding waters are some of the richest fishing waters in western Africa and serve as nesting grounds for the entire western region.
Le Touquet-Paris-Plage, commonly referred to as Le Touquet, is a commune near Étaples, in the Pas-de-Calais department, northern France. It has a population of 4,227 (2019), but welcomes up to 250,000 people during the summer.
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Bourbourg is a commune in the Nord department in northern France. It is situated in the maritime plain of northern France, in the middle of a triangle formed by Dunkirk, Calais, and Saint-Omer.
Westhoek or Maritime Flanders is a region in Belgium and France and includes the following areas:
Arcachon Basin or alternatively Arcachon Bay is a bay of the Atlantic Ocean on the southwest coast of France, situated in Pays de Buch between the Côte d'Argent and the Côte des Landes, in the region of Aquitaine. The bay covers an area of 150 square kilometres (60 sq mi) at high tide and 40 km2 (15 sq mi) at low tide. Some of its geological features are natural preservation areas.
Richel, or rather De Richel, is a permanently dry sandbank in the Wadden Sea, in the gap between the Dutch islands of Vlieland and Terschelling. It is located about 1 kilometer east of the northernmost point of Vlieland and is administered by the municipality of Vlieland. The sandbank has an average surface area of 116 hectares. It is completely flooded only during extremely high tides.
Ringkøbing Fjord, despite its name, is in fact a shallow lagoon on the west coast of Jutland.
Cape Town lies at the south-western corner of the continent of Africa. It is bounded to the south and west by the Atlantic Ocean, and to the north and east by various other municipalities in the Western Cape province of South Africa.
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The siege of Dunkirk in 1658 was a military operation by the allied forces of France and Commonwealth England intended to take the fortified port city of Dunkirk, Spain's greatest privateer base, from the Spanish and their confederates: the English royalists and French Fronduers. Dunkirk was a strategic port on the southern coast of the English Channel in the Spanish Netherlands that had often been a point of contention previously and had changed hands a number of times. Privateers operating out of Dunkirk and other ports had cost England some 1,500 to 2,000 merchant ships in the past year. The French and their English Commonwealth allies were commanded by Marshal of France Turenne. The siege would last a month and featured numerous sorties by the garrison and a determined relief attempt by the Spanish army under the command of Don Juan of Austria and his confederate English royalists under Duke of York and rebels of the French Fronde under the Great Condé that resulted in the battle of the Dunes.
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The Plain of Flanders is a low-lying plain bordering the North Sea. It is part of the Low Countries, and the North European Plain. It extends through the territories of Northern France and Belgium. It has two main sections : Maritime Flanders and Interior Flanders. The coastal plain consists mainly of sand dunes and polders.
Gridlink Interconnector is a proposed submarine power cable between England and France. The 1,400 MW high-voltage direct current connector would link Kingsnorth National Grid substation in north Kent, England, with Réseau de Transport d'Électricité Warande substation in Bourbourg (Nord) near Dunkirk in northern France.
The Étang de Sale is a coastal wetland beside the Tyrrhenian Sea on the east coast of the Haute-Corse department of the French island of Corsica.