Abstract
Cook Inlet, with its extensions, lies between 59° and 61°30′N latitude and 149° and 154°W longitude and covers more than 26 · 103 km2. This large tidal estuary is a northeast-southwest oriented indentation into the southcentral Alaskan coastline (Fig. 9-1). It differs from the other indentations of the Pacific Coast of Alaska in that its head is well behind the coastal ranges and it has broad tributary valleys drained by large rivers. The estuary flows into the Gulf of Alaska, is 90 km wide at the entrance, and has an average depth of 100 m. From its entrance it extends northeast 280 km and, at the head, bifurcates into two arms; Turnagain Arm and Knik Arm, 80 km and 83 km long, respectively. Cook Inlet is divided into upper and lower inlets by a natural constriction near the East and West forelands.
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Sharma, G.D. (1979). Cook Inlet. In: The Alaskan Shelf. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-6194-0_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-6194-0_9
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