The Great Sand Sea is an approximately 72,000 km (28,000 sq mi) sand desert (erg) in the Sahara stretched from western Egypt and eastern Libya in North Africa . Most of the area is covered by sand dunes .
6-462: The Great Sand Sea stretches about 650 km (400 mi) from north to south and 300 km (190 mi) from east to west. On satellite images, this desert shows a pattern of long sand ridges running in a roughly north-south direction. However, despite the apparent uniformity, the Great Sand Sea has two large areas with different types of megadunes. The Egyptian sand sea lies parallel to
12-609: Is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This Libya location article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Calanshio Sand Sea The Calanshio Sand Sea ( Sarīr Kalanshiyū ar Ramlī al Kabīr ) is a sand desert region located in the Libyan Desert , in Cyrenaica region's Kufra District , eastern Libya . It has a surface of approximately 62,000 km². The erg , an area of actively shifting dunes, extends from Jaghbub and Jalo in
18-731: The Calanshio Sand Sea of Libya , with which it is contiguous in the north. The dunes of the Great Sand Sea cover about 10% of the total area of the Egyptian Western Desert . Siwa is an oasis located in Egypt, about 50 km (30 mi) east of the Libyan border , in the eastern part of the Great Sand Sea or Egyptian Sand Sea. Although well-known to the Tuareg and traders who traveled with caravans across
24-616: The Sahara , Friedrich Gerhard Rohlfs was the first European to document the Great Sand Sea. He began his Saharan expeditions in 1865, and named the great expanse of dunes the Große Sandmeer (Great Sand Sea), but it was not until 1924 with the maps of Egyptian courtier Ahmed Hassanein that the full scope of the Great Sand Sea was appreciated by Europeans. 29°30′N 21°45′E / 29.500°N 21.750°E / 29.500; 21.750 This geography of Egypt article
30-531: The north to Kufra in the south, a distance of 500km. The erg lies parallel to the Egyptian Sand Sea and is contiguous with it at their northern ends. They contain dunes up to 110m in height: these lie in a roughly north-south direction and were created by the wind . The Calanshio Sand Sea is the site of the missing World War II B-24 Liberator Lady Be Good . The wreck was discovered 200 km (120 mi) north of Kufra 15 years after it
36-597: Was reported missing in 1943. The crew bailed out believing they were over the sea, when their plane ran out of fuel, and they became lost. When they landed in the Libyan Desert they could feel a northwesterly breeze. Thinking they were near the Mediterranean, they headed into the wind hoping it would lead them to safety. However, they were more than 640 km inland from the Mediterranean, and slowly died from dehydration after covering 130 km with minimal water in
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