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Turks & Caicos - Geography

The Turks and Caicos Islands is an archipelago of 40 islands and cays in the North Atlantic, located immediately southeast of the Bahamas, 145 km north of Hispaniola, and between coordinates 21°80' and 21°28' N and 71°08' and 72°27' W.

The Turks and Caicos Islands consists of two island groups: the Turks Islands, which are located to the east of the Turks Island Passage, and the Caicos Islands to the west of the passage. The Turks group includes Grand Turk (on which Cockburn Town, the seat of Government, is located), Salt Cay, and various smaller cays. The Caicos group includes South Caicos, East Caicos, Middle Caicos, North Caicos, Providenciales, West Caicos, Pine Cay, and Parrot Cay. The total land mass of the territory is 430 km2, exclusive of the large, shallow Caicos Bank, which lies to the south of the Caicos Islands group, and the Mouchoir Bank, which lies east southeast of the Turks Island group and the Mouchoir Passage. The islands are low-lying and relatively dry.

The Turks and Caicos Islands, geographically, form a part of the Bahamas, which may be considered to extend from off the Florida coast to Navidad Bank, north of the eastern end of Haiti. Of the banks and islands resting on a submarine platform which constitute this island chain, they represent the last that rise above the surface of the sea. Beyond, to the southeast, lie three banks, the first two, Mouchoir Bank and Silver Bank, in part awash, the last, Navidad Bank, entirely submerged. While accurate data are not available to prove that these three banks are being uplifted, the mere fact that the Caicos Island Bank and many other banks in the Bahamas themselves are constantly building up, warrants the conjecture that the same tidal and geological conditions govern them all and that in the course of time three additional island groups will come into being.

As the Turks and Caicos Islands really consist of two distinct groups, separated by a 21-mile passage, it may be best to discuss the character of each group separately.

The Turks Islands group consists of the two larger and inhabited keys, Grand Turk and Salt Cay, four uninhabited keys and a large number of rocks. A three-pointed bank surrounds the group and offers serious dangers to navigation. This bank has been the scene of a large number of shipwrecks. The islands derive their name from the Turk's head cactus, a globular green plant surmounted by a scarlet head resembling the Turkish fez.

The island of Grand Turk has an area of about eight square miles. Grand Turk itself is one of the bleakest and barrenest islands imaginable. Its desolation is exceeded only by that of its neighbor, Salt Cay. The greatest elevation on Grand Turk is but 70 feet. Naught but the dwarfed shrub typical of the Bahamas is seen here, and such few trees as raise their disconsolate heads above the landscape have a dejected leaning towards the west, caused by the unceasing easterly trade winds. Of late the northern coast of Grand Turk has been utilized for the planting of sisal; but beside these plants, which seem to feed on nothing and yet produce leaves, no agriculture of any kind is found. Aptly enough the Turks Islands have been named the land of "salt, sand, and sorrow."

The Caicos Islands group is separated from the Turks Islands by a 21-mile passage, known as the Turks Island Passage. For small vessels this passage presents grave dangers. The seas are apt to run high, and the currents, which at times attain a rate of three knots,10 are uncertain and variable, occasionally running northeast and at other times southwest. On approaching South Caicos Island a long land swell is experienced off Highland Point, which in stormy weather was responsible for the loss of many a local sloop.

The Caicos Islands surround the Caicos Bank, which has a triangular shape, the northern side being 58 miles long, the eastern side 39, and the western 56. The northern and eastern sides of the bank are bounded by a chain of narrow islands, while the western side is represented by a series of reefs and rocks. There can be no doubt that the bank will, in course of time, become one large island. Its interior is already represented by a low, salty plain, barely above sea level. An example of a bank that has grown up in this manner is seen directly to the westward, where Great Inagua Island presents every evidence that it originally consisted of a bank surrounded by reefs and keys.

All evidence points to the constant shoaling of the Caicos Bank. Historical accounts of the pursuit of piratical craft across the bank by men-ofwar in the eighteenth and the early part of the nineteenth century indicate that deep channels existed where by the late 19th Century a vessel drawing but six feet of water has to proceed with caution.