List of maritime features in the Spratly Islands
This page features a series of lists of maritime features in the Spratly Islands.
Features by area
Of the hundreds of maritime features in the Spratly Islands, relatively few have land permanently above sea-level that is larger than protruding rocks. There are only 13 islands and cays with a natural area above sea-level larger than one hectare. With the exception of Swallow Reef, prior to 2014 there had been no large-scale land reclamation beyond building breakwaters and piers, and extending runways.This changed dramatically in 2014 with the PRC embarking on large-scale reclamations of the lagoons of Johnson South Reef and Fiery Cross Reef, and other reclamations of then unknown extent at the Gaven Reefs and Cuarteron Reef. Reports of the extent of land reclaimed on Swallow Reef vary. The PRC land reclamations have continued on a total of seven sites. In 2015, Subi Reef, Hughes Reef and Mischief Reef were added. Refer to the table below for the most recently available data. In summary, there have been reclamations of very large areas at three sites by the PRC, reclamations of large areas at eight sites and reclamations of lesser areas at a number of sites. There does not appear to have been any reclamation of Philippine occupied areas. There have been small Taiwanese reclamations at Itu Aba, very small but functionally significant reclamations at six Malaysian sites, and a number small but significant reclamations at Vietnamese sites in 2016, most particularly at Spratly Island where the runway has been extended and a sheltered harbour added.
The following table contains the 16 largest "natural" features,, plus the features with significant amounts of reclaimed land:
| # | Feature | in Atoll | "Natural" Area | Location | Currently occupied by | Reclaimed Area | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1 | Itu Aba Island | Tizard Bank | ROCconvert|8|acre|ha|abbr=convert|37.20|ha|acrecoord|11|03|N|114|17|EFeatures by major reef/bank, etc.The boundaries of the Spratly Islands are not firmly defined. West-to-east, the islands range from the coastal waters of Vietnam to the east of Dangerous Ground and the Palawan Passage, and south-to-north from the coastal waters of Borneo and the southern South China Sea to the north of Dangerous Ground and the Reed Bank.The major feature of the area is Dangerous Ground, an oblong area approximately SW-NE, at its widest, with an area of about 52,000 nm². It lies approximately between 7.5–12°N, 113–117°E, and US NGA literatureetc. seems to consider its centre as. The remainder of the Spratly Islands are mainly to the west and south of Dangerous Ground, with some features to the east. The Spratly Islands can be roughly divided into seven sub-areas relative to Dangerous Ground:
Starting in the NW, and progressing in a generally SW direction, the features include:
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ROCconvert|8|acre|ha|abbr=convert|37.20|ha|acrecoord|11|03|N|114|17|E
