Soundings
Original title: Sondagens
Summarises depth soundings in the seas around Madeira, noting great depths between the islands and nearby shoals and banks.
Madeira is surrounded by a fairly deep sea: the sounding line has descended to 4,205 metres 120 miles off the island’s north coast, and to 3,019 metres 50 miles off the same coast, in the direction of the Azores. Between Madeira and the Canary Islands the line went down to 4,392 metres, and between Madeira and the coast of Africa, a short distance from the island, to 4,071 metres. Between Madeira and Porto Santo (‘holy harbour’), depths of more than 2,000 metres have been recorded at some points, while between Madeira and the Azores the line has been seen to descend to 4,895 metres.
The results of the many soundings made in the seas around Madeira, Porto Santo and the Desertas are recorded in the geo-hydrographic charts published by the engineer António Pedro de Azevedo in 1877, 1879 and 1886.
In the waters off Ponta do Pargo (‘sea bream point’) there is a shoal about a mile and a half long, which coastal boats must keep clear of when the wind blows from the west. Between the point of São Lourenço and the Desertas (‘deserted islands’) there is a submarine bank whose middle part lies at a depth of 30 to 130 metres.
In this article
Time
Years mentioned · 01Place
Places mentioned · 04
- Desertas
Santa Cruz. Surrounding seas sounded; a bank lies between them and São Lourenço.
An island group near Madeira that was already separated from it at the last eruptions and shares endemic species with it. It was the main orchil-harvesting area, and Wollaston found 89 beetle species there. The islands were investigated by scientific expeditions, including the Endurance scientists in 1914.
- Ponta de São Lourenço
Machico. A submarine bank lies between it and the Desertas.
The Ponta de São Lourenço is the long, narrow eastern headland of Madeira in the parish of Caniçal, said to be named after the caravel São Lourenço, with a lighthouse on its islet. The Elucidário describes its geology, seasonal vegetation, islets, fossil calcareous bodies at Piedade, land snails and use as pasture. The steamer Forerunner sank there in 1884, and a submarine bank lies between it and the Desertas.
- Ponta do Pargo
Calheta. Off it lies a shoal about a mile and a half long.
Ponta do Pargo is a parish at Madeira's western extremity, transferred from Porto do Moniz to Calheta municipality in 1871, where a lighthouse long demanded was first lit in 1922. It is watered by the old Rabaçal levada, grows Sercial vines, gives its name to a white cattle sub-breed, and was the birthplace of Manuel da Costa Dias and João Pestana Júnior.
- Porto Santo
Depths over 2000 m recorded between it and Madeira.
An island of the archipelago, settled alongside Madeira and forming one of the three captaincies. It has always constituted a single parish, dedicated to Nossa Senhora da Piedade, whose church was repeatedly sacked. The Elucidário records the Moorish pirate raid of 1617, its own Misericórdia and a rainwater channel built on this drought-prone island.
People
People mentioned · 01- António Pedro de Azevedo1814–1889
Engineer who published geo-hydrographic charts of Madeiran seas in 1877, 1879 and 1886.