"Territories comprise Australia's Indian Ocean Territories. The Australian Government provides Commonwealth-level government services through the Indian Ocean Territories Administration and the Department of Infrastructure, Regional Development and Cities. As per the Federal Government's Territories Law Reform Act 1992, which came into force on 1 July 1992, Western Australian laws are applied to the Cocos Islands, ""so far as they are capable of applying in the Territory""; non-application or partial application of such laws is at the discretion of the federal government. The Act also gives Western Australian courts judicial power over the islands. The Cocos (Keeling) Islands remain constitutionally distinct"
"Cocos Island (Guam) Cocos Island () is an island off the southern tip of the United States territory of Guam, located within the Merizo Barrier Reef, part of the municipality of Merizo. The island is uninhabited, long in a southwest-northeast direction, between and wide, and has an area of . It sits atop the southwestern coral reef rim of Cocos Lagoon. The east coast of the island is a day resort with a pool, volleyball court, cafe, ice cream parlor, restaurant and bar, and water sports equipment rentals. Visitors to the resort can snorkel, dive, kayak, dolphin watch, parasail, jet"
"the islands, and the Andaman Sea lies to the east. The Burmese mainland is to the north. The island of Preparis lies to the north-northeast of the Coco Islands. The Coco Islands consist of three main islands, namely Great Coco Island and the smaller Little Coco Island, separated by the Alexandra Channel, as well as Table Island, a third small island located near Great Coco Island. Geographically, they are a part of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands archipelago (most of which belongs to India) and are separated from Landfall Island, the northernmost island in the Indian part of the archipelago,"
"Cocos Island Cocos Island () is an island designated as a National Park off the shore of Costa Rica, that does not allow inhabitants other than Costa Rican Park Rangers. It constitutes the 11th of the 13 districts of Puntarenas Canton of the province of Puntarenas. It is located in the Pacific Ocean, approximately from the Pacific shore of Costa Rica. With an area of approximately , about and a perimeter of around , this island is more or less rectangular in shape. It is the southernmost point on the North American continent if outer islands are included. Surrounded by"
"Coco Islands The Coco Islands () are a small group of islands in the northeastern Bay of Bengal. They are part of the Yangon Region of Myanmar. The islands are located south of the city of Yangon. The islands took their current name from Portuguese sailors in the 16th century, ""coco"" being the Portuguese word for the coconut. The Andaman Islands were taken over by the English East India Company in the 18th century. In the 19th century, the British government in India established a penal colony in the Andamans, and the Coco Islands were a source of food for"
"Cocos Lagoon Cocos Lagoon appears as a small incomplete coral atoll attached to the south-western coast of Guam near the area of the village of Merizo. It stretches about east-west and north-south, covering an area of more than . Cocos Island and Babe Island sit atop the southern portion of the Merizo Barrier Reef and separate Cocos Lagoon from the open ocean in the south. In the east, Cocos Lagoon is separated from Achang Reef by narrow Manell Channel that leads to Achang Bay. In the north-west, Mamaon Channel separates Cocos Lagoon from the main island of Guam and allows"
"Guard announced their findings on 20 February 2006 and warned people not to eat fish caught in the lagoon. Cocos Island is one of the few locations to have had the endangered Guam rail reintroduced to it. Cocos Island (Guam) Cocos Island () is an island off the southern tip of the United States territory of Guam, located within the Merizo Barrier Reef, part of the municipality of Merizo. The island is uninhabited, long in a southwest-northeast direction, between and wide, and has an area of . It sits atop the southwestern coral reef rim of Cocos Lagoon. The east"
"deep waters with counter-currents, Cocos Island is admired by scuba divers for its populations of hammerhead sharks, rays, dolphins and other large marine species. The extremely wet climate and oceanic character give Cocos an ecological character that is not shared with either the Galápagos Archipelago or any of the other islands (for example, Malpelo, Gorgona or Coiba) in this region of the world. Cocos Island was declared a Costa Rican National Park by means of Executive Decree in 1978. Cocos Island National Park was designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1997. In 2002, the World Heritage Site designation"
"Cabo Gracias a Dios Cabo Gracias a Dios is a cape located in the middle of the east coast of Central America, within what is variously called the Mosquito Coast and La Mosquitia. It is the point where the Rio Coco flows into the Caribbean, and is the border between the Nicaraguan North Caribbean Coast Autonomous Region and the Honduran department also known as Gracias a Dios. The point was designated as the official Honduras - Nicaragua border by an award of King Alfonso XIII of Spain in 1906, and confirmed by the International Court of Justice in 1960. The"
"into an uncharted seamount about 560 kilometers (350 statute miles) south of Guam at a speed of , sustaining serious damage and killing one seaman. Muirfield Seamount The Muirfield Seamount is a submarine mountain located in the Indian Ocean approximately 130 kilometres (70 nautical miles) southwest of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands. The Cocos Islands are an Australian territory, and therefore the Muirfield Seamount is within Australia's Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). The Muirfield Seamount is a submerged archipelago, approximately in diameter and below the surface of the sea. A 1999 biological survey of the seamount performed by the Australian Commonwealth Scientific"
"land area of . Only Home Island and West Island are populated. The Cocos Malays maintain weekend shacks, referred to as pondoks, on most of the larger islands. There are no rivers or lakes on either atoll. Fresh water resources are limited to water lenses on the larger islands, underground accumulations of rainwater lying above the seawater. These lenses are accessed through shallow bores or wells. Cocos (Keeling) Islands experiences tropical monsoon climate (""Am"") according to Köppen climate classification as the archipelago lies approximately in the midway between the Equator and the Tropic of Capricorn. The archipelago has two distinct"
"Cocos Plate The Cocos Plate is a young oceanic tectonic plate beneath the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of Central America, named for Cocos Island, which rides upon it. The Cocos Plate was created approximately 23 million years ago when the Farallon Plate broke into two pieces, which also created the Nazca Plate. The Cocos Plate also broke into two pieces, creating the small Rivera Plate. The Cocos Plate is bounded by several different plates. To the northeast it is bounded by the North American Plate and the Caribbean Plate. To the west it is bounded by the Pacific"
"Bocas del Toro Archipelago The Bocas del Toro Archipelago is a group of islands in the Caribbean Sea in the northwest of Panama. The archipelago separates Almirante Bay and Chiriquí Lagoon from the open Caribbean Sea. The archipelago is part of the Bocas del Toro District which is part of Bocas del Toro Province. The major city is Bocas del Toro, also called Bocas Town, on Isla Colón. The islands are accessible by water taxis and private boats. Isla Colón is accessible by airplanes, ferries, private boats, and water taxis. Bocas del Toro ""Isla Colón"" International Airport, located just west"
"Caroline Islands The Caroline Islands (or the Carolines) are a widely scattered archipelago of tiny islands in the western Pacific Ocean, to the north of New Guinea. Politically they are divided between the Federated States of Micronesia in the eastern part of the group, and Palau at the extreme western end. Historically, this area was also called Nuevas Filipinas or New Philippines as they were part of the Spanish East Indies and governed from Manila in the Philippines. The Carolines span a distance of approximately 3540 kilometers (2200 miles), from Tobi, Palau at the westernmost point to Kosrae at the"
"boat access to Merizo. Southeastward of the channel, down to Achang Bay, there is no separation to the main island of Guam. Along the west side, the barrier reef uncovers in spots but has no islands. Cocos Lagoon Cocos Lagoon appears as a small incomplete coral atoll attached to the south-western coast of Guam near the area of the village of Merizo. It stretches about east-west and north-south, covering an area of more than . Cocos Island and Babe Island sit atop the southern portion of the Merizo Barrier Reef and separate Cocos Lagoon from the open ocean in the"
"Geology of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands The geology of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands may be a part of the Galapagos hot spot. The island is the mountain top of non-seismic, undersea Cocos Ridge. Although the ridge dates to the Miocene, potassium-argon dating and paleomagnetic research indicates that the above-water part of the island formed within the last two million years in the Quaternary. A shield volcano built up, followed by explosive eruptions and smaller subsequent eruptions. Alkali basalt and trachyte are the only forms of bedrock on the island and fractional crystallization of olivine and clinopyroxene played a key role"
"the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and west of Darwin, Northern Territory. Its closest point to the Australian mainland is from the town of Exmouth, Western Australia. Christmas Island has 80 kilometres of shoreline but only small parts of the shoreline are easily accessible. The island's perimeter is embodied by sharp cliff faces, making many of the island's beaches difficult to get to. Some of the easily accessible beaches include Flying Fish Cove (main beach), Lily Beach, Ethel Beach, and Isabel Beach, while the more difficult beaches to access include Greta Beach, Dolly Beach, Winifred Beach, Merrial Beach, and West White Beach,"
"loosely based Isla Nublar on ""Isla del Coco"" or ""Cocos Island"" in the eastern Pacific. Cocos Island is a Costa Rican National Park 340 miles off the west coast of Costa Rica. Like Isla Nublar, which means ""Clouded Island"", Cocos Island receives especially high rainfall year-round and is the only island in the eastern Pacific that features cloud forests. The physical geography is also similar to Nublar, in that the island is guarded by high cliffs, rugged terrain, and dense tropical vegetation. It is much smaller than Isla Nublar, however, coming in at just over 9 square miles. Because of"
"fictitious ""Isla Nublar"" of Costa Rica, which is modeled after Cocos Island. The video game """", from 1998, uses a map of Cocos Island to illustrate the island. Cocos Island Cocos Island () is an island designated as a National Park off the shore of Costa Rica, that does not allow inhabitants other than Costa Rican Park Rangers. It constitutes the 11th of the 13 districts of Puntarenas Canton of the province of Puntarenas. It is located in the Pacific Ocean, approximately from the Pacific shore of Costa Rica. With an area of approximately , about and a perimeter of"
"to the northeast of the subducting edge lies the continuous arc of volcanos —also known as the Central America Volcanic Arc— stretching from Costa Rica to Guatemala, and a belt of earthquakes that extends farther north, into Mexico. The northern boundary of the Cocos Plate is the Middle America Trench. The eastern boundary is a transform fault, the Panama Fracture Zone. The southern boundary is a mid-oceanic ridge, the Galapagos Rise. The western boundary is another mid-ocean ridge, the East Pacific Rise. A hotspot under the Galapagos Islands lies along the Galapagos Rise. (""see"" Galapagos hotspot) The Rivera Plate north"
"Comoro Islands The Comoro Islands or Comoros (Shikomori ""Komori""; , ""Juzur al-Qomor""; French Les Comores) form an archipelago of volcanic islands situated off the south-east coast of Africa, to the east of Mozambique and north-west of Madagascar. The islet of Banc du Geyser and the Glorioso Islands are part of the archipelago. The islands are politically divided between Union of the Comoros (pop. 795,601) and two territories of France : the region of Mayotte (pop. 212,645) and the Glorioso Islands, a part of the Scattered Islands in the Indian Ocean, the 5th district of the French Southern and Antarctic Lands."
"occurred in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of the Mexican state of Michoacán, a distance of more than 350 km (217 mi) from the city, in the Cocos Plate subduction zone, specifically in a section of the fault line known as the Michoacán seismic gap. The Cocos Plate pushes against and slides under the North American Plate, primarily along the coasts of the states of Michoacán and Guerrero in Mexico. Volatile trenches along the Cocos plate generally have had seismic events 30 to 70 years before 1985. This subduction zone outside the Michoacán gap was the source of 42"
"Puerto Rico is a self-governing unincorporated territory of the United States located in the northeastern Caribbean Sea, east of the Dominican Republic and west of the Virgin Islands. It was ceded to the United States as part of the Treaty of Paris during the Spanish–American War. In 1952, the U.S. Congress ratified the Constitution of Puerto Rico, proclaiming Puerto Rico as an insular commonwealth. However, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico has territorial status subject to United States congressional authority under the Territorial Clause of the U.S. Constitution, ""to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory"
"Geography of the United States Virgin Islands Geography of the United States Virgin Islands The United States Virgin Islands are a group of several dozen islands and cays located in the Caribbean, about southeast of Florida, north of Venezuela, east of Puerto Rico, and immediately west and south of the British Virgin Islands. The U.S. Virgin Islands lie near the boundary of the North American Plate and the Caribbean Plate, roughly south of the Puerto Rico Trench and near the Anegada Passage, a key shipping lane. Together with the British Virgin Islands, Vieques, and Culebra, they make up the Virgin"
"was extended to include an expanded marine zone of . In addition, it is included in the list of ""Wetlands of International Importance"". In 2009, Cocos Island was short-listed as a candidate to be declared one of the New7Wonders of Nature of the world by the New7Wonders of the World Foundation, and ranked second in the islands category. Thanks to the breathtaking marine life in its waters (see Fauna section below), Cocos Island was named one of the best 10 scuba diving spots in the world by PADI (Professional Association of Diving Instructors) and a ""must do"" according to diving"
"Muirfield Seamount The Muirfield Seamount is a submarine mountain located in the Indian Ocean approximately 130 kilometres (70 nautical miles) southwest of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands. The Cocos Islands are an Australian territory, and therefore the Muirfield Seamount is within Australia's Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). The Muirfield Seamount is a submerged archipelago, approximately in diameter and below the surface of the sea. A 1999 biological survey of the seamount performed by the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) revealed that the area is depauperate. The Muirfield Seamount was discovered accidentally in 1973 when the cargo ship MV ""Muirfield"""
"much closer to the surrounding ocean floor. The Malpelo Ridge, which is long was once believed to be part of the Carnegie Ridge. The Cocos Ridge is a 1000 km long feature located on the Cocos plate and is orientated parallel to the plates motion from the 91 degree west transform fault at the Galapagos Spreading Centre towards the Panamanian coast. The north eastern end of the ridge dates from about 13–14.5 million years ago. However, Cocos Island at the northern end of the ridge is only 2 million years old, and was therefore created at a time well after"
"West Indies The West Indies is a region of the North Atlantic Ocean in the Caribbean that includes the island countries and surrounding waters of three major archipelagos: the Greater Antilles, the Lesser Antilles and the Lucayan Archipelago. The region is known as the area running from Florida westward along the Gulf Coast, and then south along the Mexican coast through Central America and then eastward across the northern coast of South America. Indigenous peoples were the first inhabitants of the West Indies. In 1492, Christopher Columbus became the first European to arrive at the islands, where he is believed"
"storms. Geography of the United States Virgin Islands Geography of the United States Virgin Islands The United States Virgin Islands are a group of several dozen islands and cays located in the Caribbean, about southeast of Florida, north of Venezuela, east of Puerto Rico, and immediately west and south of the British Virgin Islands. The U.S. Virgin Islands lie near the boundary of the North American Plate and the Caribbean Plate, roughly south of the Puerto Rico Trench and near the Anegada Passage, a key shipping lane. Together with the British Virgin Islands, Vieques, and Culebra, they make up the"
"Geography of Puerto Rico The geography of Puerto Rico consists of an archipelago located between the Caribbean Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of the Virgin Islands. The main island of Puerto Rico is the smallest and most eastern of the Greater Antilles. With an area of , it is the third largest island in the United States and the 82nd largest island in the world. Various smaller islands and cays, including Vieques, Culebra, Mona, Desecheo, and Caja de Muertos comprise the remainder of the archipelago with only Culebra and Vieques being inhabited"
"Patos Island (Venezuela) Patos Island (, Duck Island) is a small uninhabited island in the northwestern Gulf of Paria. The island is a part of the ""Dependencias Federales"" (Federal Dependencies) of Venezuela. Patos Island is located about northeast of Caracas in the ""Golfo de Paria"" (Gulf of Paria). The coordinates are . It lies in the ""Boca Grande"" strait of the Bocas del Dragón (Dragon's Mouth), approximately 4 km off the Paria Peninsula of mainland Venezuela and about 10 km west-south-west of Chacachacare, which is part of Trinidad and Tobago. The uninhabited island has an area of only 0.65 square"
"Caribbean Sea The Caribbean Sea (; ; ) is a sea of the Atlantic Ocean in the tropics of the Western Hemisphere. It is bounded by Mexico and Central America to the west and south west, to the north by the Greater Antilles starting with Cuba, to the east by the Lesser Antilles, and to the south by the north coast of South America. The entire area of the Caribbean Sea, the numerous islands of the West Indies, and adjacent coasts, are collectively known as the Caribbean. The Caribbean Sea is one of the largest seas and has an area"
"ayuntamientes (municipalities): Geography of Puerto Rico The geography of Puerto Rico consists of an archipelago located between the Caribbean Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of the Virgin Islands. The main island of Puerto Rico is the smallest and most eastern of the Greater Antilles. With an area of , it is the third largest island in the United States and the 82nd largest island in the world. Various smaller islands and cays, including Vieques, Culebra, Mona, Desecheo, and Caja de Muertos comprise the remainder of the archipelago with only Culebra and Vieques"