page_title: Chesterfield Islands
section_title: Bellona Reefs
hierarchical_section_title: Chesterfield Islands / Location / Bellona Reefs
caption_attribution_description: English: Mission: ISS006 CORAL SEA SOUTH BELLONA REEF Center Point Latitude: -22.0 Center Point Longitude: 159.5 Nadir Point Latitude: -22.7, Longitude: 158.8 (Negative numbers indicate south for latitude and west for longitude) Nadir to Photo Center Direction: Northeast Sun Azimuth: 100 (Clockwise angle in degrees from north to the sun measured at the nadir point) Spacecraft Altitude: 215 nautical miles (398 km) Sun Elevation Angle: 50 (Angle in degrees between the horizon and the sun, measured at the nadir point)
context_page_description: Chesterfield Islands are a French archipelago of New Caledonia located in the Coral Sea, 550 km northwest of Grande Terre, the main island of New Caledonia. The archipelago is 120 km long and 70 km broad, made up of 11 uninhabited islets and many reefs. The land area of the islands is less than 10 km².
  During periods of lowered sea level during the Pleistocene ice ages an island of considerable size occupied the location of the archipelago.
  Bellona Reef, 164 km south-southeast of Chesterfield, is geologically separated from the Chesterfield archipelago but commonly included.
context_section_description: Captain Matthew Boyd of Bellona named the reefs for his ship. He had delivered convicts to New South Wales in 1793 and was on his way to China to pick up a cargo at Canton to take back to Britain for the British East India Company when he passed the reefs in February–March 1793.
  West Point 21°52′S 159°25′E,
  Olry Reef 21°26′S 159°34′E, on the south an unvegetated sand cay Caye Est Bellona
  Middle Bellona Reefs 21°25′S 158°25′E,
  Observatory Cay 21°24′S 158°51′E,
  Booby Reef 21°01′S 158°34′E,
  Northwest Bellona Reef 20°52′S 158°28′E,
  Noel Bank 20°32′S 158°34′E,
  South Bellona Reef or West Point 21°52′S 159°25′E, Approximately 3 m tall sand islet, reported to be non-existent by 1988 (Sailing Directions)
  Lieutenant John Lamb, R.N., Commander of the ship Baring, spent three days in the neighborhood of Booby and Bellona Shoals and reefs. Lamb took soundings between nineteen and forty-five fathoms (114–270 ft), and frequently passed shoals, upon which the sea was breaking. Lamb defined the limits of the rocky ground as the parallels of 20°40′ and 21°50′ and the meridians of 158°15′ and 159°30′. He also saw a sandy islet, surrounded by a chain of rocks, at 21°24½′ south and 158°30′ east. The ship Minerva measured the water's depth as eight fathoms (48 ft), with the appearance of shallower water to the southwest; this last danger is in a line between the two shoals at about longitude 159°20′ east, as described by James Horsburgh.
  Observatory Cay (Caye de l'Observatoire) 21°24′S 158°51′E, 800 m long and 2 m high, lies on the Middle Bellona Reefs at the southern end of the Chesterfield Reefs and 180 nm east of Kenn Reef.
caption: South Bellona Reefs
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