Water Dynamical Processes in the South China Sea

The South China Sea (SCS) has an area of about 3.5 million km and depths ranging from the shallowest coastal fringe to 5,567 m, with an average depth of 1,212 m (Fig. 5.1, Morton and Blackmore, 2001). It is also studded with numerous islets, atolls, and reefs, many of which are just awash at low tide. The water dynamics plays an important part in the biogeochemical processes of the SCS. 

There is the relationship between the interannual variability in the index of the SCS Warm Water and the monsoon break over the SCS. The SCS Warm Water, and the warm pools in both the western equatorial Pacific and the Indian Oceans are in the same coupled system on a large scale, sharing a long period of oscillation of about 4.8 years. During the years when colder water occurs in the SCS, an atmospheric anticyclone maintains itself to the east of the Philippines in summer. A low frequency activity associated with the anticyclone results in low frequency oscillation in the precipitation field over this region, whereas the weak subtropical high over the western Pacific travels eastward in summer, which is responsible for the anomalous distribution of meridional vapor transport. 

The northern and northwestern regions are wide shelves leading to the East China Sea (ECS) through the 50-m deep Taiwan Strait. Furthermore, the SCS 

The most important offshore systems in the SCS are coral reefs (Fig. 5.2). The most abundant reefs he in the waters to the south of Hainan, that is, the more than 20 atolls and islets of the Macclesfield Bank (Zhongsha Qun-dao) and the approximately 36 islands of the Paracel Islands (Xisha Qundao) (Morton and Blackmore, 2001). 

HalfMoon Shoal 46- Prince Consort Bank 47. Prince of Wales Bank 

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