page_title: Bahía de Ponce
section_title: Hydrography
hierarchical_section_title: Bahía de Ponce / Hydrography
caption_attribution_description: English: Isla Ratones (seen from the Hotel Ponce Holiday Inn), Ponce, Puerto Rico
context_page_description: Bahía de Ponce is a bay in Barrio Playa, Ponce, Puerto Rico. The Bay is home to the most important commercial harbor on the Puerto Rico south coast and the second largest in Puerto Rico. The Cardona Island Light is located on the Bay to mark the way into the Bay from the nearby Caja de Muertos Light.
  Bahía de Ponce is located in southern Puerto Rico, about midway on the southern coast. It has a width of 3.5 mi, a length of 1.5 miles, its shore is about 4.0 mi and its area is approximately 3,300 acres. Typical bay depths are in the 20 ft-to-40 ft range, but these dip to 50 feet at the drenched piers.
  The Bay provides recreation, sightseeing and tourist attractions. It also provides for commercial and industrial activities. The Rafael Cordero Santiago Port of the Americas is located here as well as the La Guancha Recreational and Cultural Complex, the La Guancha Boardwalk, and Club Náutico de Ponce. The annual Cruce a Nado Internacional swimming sports event is held at this Bay every September.
context_section_description: The continental shelf at Bahía de Ponce is over 5 miles wide, after which it dips steeply into the Venezuelan Basin.  
  Maritime obstructions for vessels entering the Bay include seven features: Bajo Tasmanian, Bajo Cardona, Roca Ahogado, Las Hojitas, Cayo Viejo, Isla de Ratones and Cayo Arenas. Bajo Tasmanian is a mile-long bank to the east of the harbor entrance, with several points with shallow depths (16 to 18 feet deep). The part closes to the entrance channel has depths as shallow as about 20 feet. Bajo Cardona extends 600 yards east-southeast from Isla de Cardona; it has depths of 12 to 16 feet. With an east wind of 25 knots or more, the mud from the reef off Isla de Gatas discolors the water across the channel to Isla de Cardona and beyond making the channel off the piers at Punta Peñoncillo appear shoal. Roca Ahogado is a bare rock in the middle of Caleta de Cabullones, to the east of Bahía de Ponce with shoal water of 4 to 18 feet extending up to 0.2-mile from it. Oriented in a northeast direction, Las Hojitas, northwest of Isla de Cardona, is 0.8-mile long and has a small patch awash near its southwest end. The reef has depths of 2 to 11 feet. Cayo Viejo, located 0.8-mile west of Isla de Cardona, is about 0.3-mile in diameter and awash at its shoalest point. Isla de Ratones, on the west entrance to the Bay and a mile offshore, is a low island with a reef that bares at low water extending a mile east-southeast of it. Cayo Arenas, located 0.5-mile east of Isla de Ratones, is surrounded by a reef and shoals that extend up to 200 yards from its shore. The principal entrance to the Bay is east of Isla de Cardona. There is a 600-foot-wide entrance channel which is 36 feet deep, then an inner channel 200-foot-wide 36 feet deep leading to an irregular shaped turning basin, with a 950-foot turning diameter adjacent to the municipal bulkhead. The entrance channel is marked by lights, and buoys. A 0.2-mile-wide channel between Isla de Cardona and Las Hojitas is available for use by small vessels.
caption: Isla de Ratones vessel obstruction at Bahía de Ponce (Photo taken from the north looking south, with the open Caribbean Sea in the background)
exif: {}