South America: Terrain & Seafloor 48 x 36 (Portrait Orientation)

Map elements include:

• A digital elevation model of all continental terrain within the map frame. Individual publicly available tiles of terrain data were sequentially downloaded from the U.S. Geological Survey in TIFF format. Each individual tile was then stitched into a continental mosaic, then “clipped” to highly detailed coastlines. All geoprocessing was performed using ESRI’s ArcGIS Pro software.

• A digital bathymetric model of the surrounding seafloor. Raw, publicly available bathymetric TIFF imagery tiles were obtained from the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO) via the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and combined into a mosaic that fills the map frame. All seafloor geoprocessing was performed using ESRI’s ArcGIS Pro software.

• A detailed depiction of:

  •  Inland water bodies, including Patagonia's intermittent lakes and salt flats

  • Mountain summits with corresponding elevations in feet

• Volcanic mountain summits with corresponding elevations in feet

• Mountain ranges, plateaus, valleys, and other significant landforms

• Glaciers, courtesy of the Global Land Ice Measurements from Space (GLIMS) program

• Islands, points, capes, and other coastal features

• Deserts

• National, state, and territorial capitals and significant cities scaled by population

• International and subnational political boundaries

• Seafloor ridges, seamount chains, basins, fracture zones, and other significant features

• Pinpoint locations of significant seamounts, guyots, banks, shoals, reefs, and other submerged features

South America: Terrain & Seafloor was the second map completed in the Continental Terrain & Seafloor Series. As the continent is positioned along the southeastern quadrant of the Pacific Ring of Fire, volcanism stands out on the map along the spine of the Andes and along the Pacific Coast into Central America, flanked by the volatile Peru-Chile-Ecuador Trench system.

The floor of the Atlantic Ocean is revealed with complex systems of rises, troughs, and significant clusters of seamounts off the coast of northeastern Brazil.

In addition to fire, ice also plays a starring role on the map, as massive Andean ice fields and the Antarctic Peninsula and its research stations and adjacent islands are not to be missed in the southern reaches.