Osprey Reef
- ISS004-E-7013
- 31 January 2002
- 06:27 UTC
Osprey Reef — a good example of an isolated oceanic reef — is located within the Coral Sea Islands Territory, situated around 330 km northeast from Cairns, Queensland. It lies some 125 km east from the Great Barrier Reef and 220 km due east from Queensland's Cape Melville. It is the northernmost reef on the Coral Sea Shelf (Queensland Plateau).
The reef is roughly oval in shape, measuring 25 km in length and up to 12 km in width, covering around 195 km². The lagoon, which is up to 30 m deep, is nearly completely enclosed, except for a narrow pass on its western side. The beak-like feature at the north end of Osprey Reef is known as North Horn. Just visible in the image are the faint wisps of Shark Reef, located to the southeast of Osprey Reef (southeast is towards the bottom-left in this image). Shark Reef is located around 15 km from Osprey Reef's southern tip of Rapid Horn.
image: earth sciences and image analysis laboratory, nasa johnson space center
