James Ross Island is a large island off the southeast side and near the northeastern extremity of the Antarctic Peninsula, from which it is separated by Prince Gustav Channel. Rising to 1,630 metres (5,350 ft), it is irregularly shaped and extends 64 km (40 miles) in a north–south direction. It was charted in October 1903 by the Swedish Antarctic Expedition under Otto Nordenskiöld, who named it for Sir James Clark Ross, the leader of a British expedition to this area in 1842 that discovered and roughly charted a number of points along the eastern side of the island. The style, "James" Ross Island is used to avoid confusion with the more widely known Ross Island in McMurdo Sound.[1]
It is one of several islands around the peninsula known as Graham Land, which is closer to South America than any other part of that continent.[2]
The island was connected to the Antarctic mainland by an ice shelf until 1995, when the ice shelf collapsed, making the Prince Gustav Channel passable for the first time.[3]
The first dinosaur discovered in Antarctica was Antarctopelta oliveroi, a medium-sized ankylosaur found on James Ross Island by Argentiniangeologists Eduardo Olivero and Roberto Scasso in 1986. The dinosaur was recovered from the Campanian stage of the Upper CretaceousSanta Marta Formation, about 2 km (1.2 mi) south of Santa Marta Cove on the north part of the island. The ankylosaur was not formally named until 2006.[4]
James Ross Island from NASA's DC-8 aircraft during an AirSAR March 2004 mission over the Antarctic Peninsula
In 2015, an iguanodontid found in 2002 by Fernando Novas[7] was named Morrosaurus antarcticus by Sebastian Rozadilla, Federico Lisandro Agnolin, Fernando Emilio Novas, Alexis Rolando Aranciaga Mauro, Matthew J. Motta, Juan Manuel Lirio Marcelo and Pablo Isasi. The genus name refers to the site of El Morro on James Ross Island, where the remains of the species were found. The specific name refers to Antarctica.[8]
Named features
James Ross Island features several features named by various surveying and exploration groups.
Brandy Bay (63°50′S57°59′W / 63.833°S 57.983°W / -63.833; -57.983), a bay 2 nautical miles (4 km) wide on the northwest coast of James Ross Island, entered west of Bibby Point. It was probably first seen by Otto Nordenskiöld in 1903, and was surveyed by the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey (FIDS) in 1945. During a subsequent visit to this bay by a FIDS party in 1952, there was a discussion as to whether medicinal brandy should be used as treatment for a dog bite. The name arose naturally from this incident.[9] On the southwest point of Brandy Bay, San Carlos Point is named after a hut, Refugio San Carlos, established in 1959 by Argentine army personnel.[10]
Stoneley Point (63°52′S58°7′W / 63.867°S 58.117°W / -63.867; -58.117), a rocky point on the northwest coast of James Ross Island, 4 nautical miles (7 km) west of Brandy Bay. It was named after Robert Stoneley, a FIDS geologist at Hope Bay, by the UK-APC in 1952.[13]
^Rubin, Jeff (2008). Antarctica, p. 276. Lonely Planet.
^Salgado, L.; Gasparini, Z. (2006). "Reappraisal of an ankylosaurian dinosaur from the Upper Cretaceous of James Ross Island (Antarctica)". Geodiversitas. 28 (1): 119–135.
^Coria, R. A.; Moly, J. J.; Reguero, M.; Santillana, S.; Marenssi, S. (2013). "A new ornithopod (Dinosauria; Ornithischia) from Antarctica". Cretaceous Research. 41: 186–193. doi:10.1016/j.cretres.2012.12.004. hdl:11336/76749.
^Novas, F.E., A.V. Cambiaso, J. Lirio, & H. Núñez, 2002, "Paleobiogeografía de los dinosaurios cretácicos polares de Gondwana", Ameghiniana (Resúmenes) 39(4): 15R
^Rozadilla, Sebastián; Agnolin, Federico L.; Novas, Fernando E.; Aranciaga Rolando, Alexis M.; Motta, Matías J.; Lirio, Juan M.; Isasi, Marcelo P. (2016). "A new ornithopod (Dinosauria, Ornithischia) from the Upper Cretaceous of Antarctica and its palaeobiogeographical implications". Cretaceous Research. 57: 311–324. doi:10.1016/j.cretres.2015.09.009.
