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26-397: Øresund, along with the Great Belt , the Little Belt and the Kiel Canal , is one of four waterways that connect the Baltic Sea to the Atlantic Ocean via Kattegat , Skagerrak , and the North Sea ; this makes it one of the busiest waterways in the world. The Øresund Bridge , between the Danish capital Copenhagen and the Swedish city of Malmö , inaugurated on 1 July 2000, connects

52-458: A spit . Such landforms are common in the area and "ör" is found in the names of many places along the strait, e.g. Helsingør , Skanör , Dragør and Halör , an important center of trade during the Viking Age . The northern boundary between Øresund and Kattegat is a line which goes from Gilleleje at Zealand's northern peak to the westernmost point of Kullaberg (Kullen's Lighthouse) at

78-422: A bi-national metropolitan area with close to 4 million inhabitants. The HH Ferry route , between Helsingør , Denmark and Helsingborg , Sweden, in the northern part of Øresund, is one of the world's busiest international ferry routes, with more than 70 departures from each harbour per day. Øresund is a geologically young strait that formed 8,500–8,000 years ago as a result of rising sea levels . Previously,

104-458: A border for many maritime species of animals. Only 52 known salt-water species reside in the central Baltic Sea, compared to around 1500 in the North Sea . Close to 600 species are known to exist in at least some part of Øresund. Well-known examples, for which the bottom salinity makes a distinct breeding border, include lobster, small crabs ( Carcinus maenas ), several species of flatfish and

130-539: A financial compensation of 90 million Danish kroner , and Finland withdrew the lawsuit. On 4 April 2024, the Danish Maritime Authority ordered the closure of an area of the strait south-west of Korsør to shipping and aviation after a missile launcher aboard HDMS Niels Juel malfunctioned during a naval exercise. 55°19′59″N 11°00′00″E  /  55.333°N 11.000°E  / 55.333; 11.000 Drogden Drogden

156-553: A fixed traffic connection over the Great Belt (later Great Belt Fixed Link ), including a bridge that Finland alleged would prevent the passage of certain ships to and from Finland: Finnish-built mobile offshore drilling units would be unable to pass beneath the bridge. The case was discontinued in 1992, before the Court had to rule on the merits, because Finland and Denmark reached a negotiated settlement. The two countries negotiated

182-666: A tunnel also runs under the East Channel. In pre-glacial times a river, which the Baltic Sea basin then contained and which geologists call the Eridanos , must have passed near the region as the rise of South Swedish Dome in Neogene times diverted it south from its previous path across central Sweden. The Great Belt originated as Dana River that was eroded into existence 9000–8900 years ago when post-glacial rebound made

208-659: Is a strait between the major islands of Zealand ( Sjælland ) and Funen ( Fyn ) in Denmark . It is one of the three Danish Straits . Effectively dividing Denmark in two, the Belt was served by the Great Belt ferries from the late 19th century until the islands were connected by the Great Belt Fixed Link in 1997–98. The Great Belt is the largest and most important of the three Danish Straits that connect

234-626: Is a channel through Øresund . The trench is located on the Danish side of the Øresund , between Saltholm and Amager . The road and railway connection between Denmark and Sweden passes below it in the Drogden Tunnel . The maximum depth for ships to pass is 8 meters. Drogden is heavily trafficked, and about 30 000 ships pass per year in the fairway. 55°36′8″N 12°42′35″E  /  55.60222°N 12.70972°E  / 55.60222; 12.70972 This Danish location article

260-454: Is about 10–12 PSU in the southern part, but above 20 PSU north of Helsingør. Near the seafloor (where the sea is deep enough), conditions are more stable and salinity is always oceanic (above 30 PSU) below a certain depth that varies between 10 and 15 metres. In the southern part, however, the depth is 5–6 metres (outside the rather narrow waterways Drogden and Flintrännan ), and this is the definite border of oceanic salt water, therefore also

286-577: The Ancylus Lake that occupied the Baltic depression lose its outlets around Gothenburg tipping over in the south. The forming of the Dana River is thought to have caused a dramatic erosion of sediments, peatlands and forests along its way. This led initially to a relatively rapid fall in the lake level over hundreds of years to then continue falling at a lower pace. Rising sea levels allowed

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312-620: The Ancylus Lake , a fresh-water body occupying the Baltic basin , had been connected to the sea solely via the Great Belt . The incursion of salt water via Øresund marked the beginning of the modern Baltic Sea as a salt-water body. The strait is called Øresund in Danish (and Norwegian ), and Öresund in Swedish , informally Sundet (lit. "the Strait") in all three languages. The first part of

338-661: The Baltic Sea to the Kattegat strait and Atlantic Ocean . The others are the Øresund and the Little Belt straits. The Great Belt is 60 km (37 miles) long and 16–32 km (10–20 miles) wide. It flows around two major islands: Samsø in the north and Langeland to the south. At Sprogø the Great Belt divides into the East Channel and the West Channel. Both are traversed by the Great Belt Fixed Link , but

364-420: The lion's mane jellyfish ; the latter can sometimes drift into the southwest Baltic Sea, but it cannot reproduce there. There are daily tides, but the lunar attraction cannot force much water to move from west to east, or vice versa, in narrow waters where the current is either northbound or southbound. So, not much of the difference in water levels in Øresund is due to daily tides, and other circumstances "hide"

390-433: The Øresund . Non-Danish vessels were restricted to the Øresund channel. Merchants paid the tax under threat of having their vessels sunk or confiscated. During the middle of the 19th century, this practice became a diplomatic liability and the Danish government agreed to terminate it, achieving an international financial compensation in return. Danish waterways were consequently opened to foreign shipping. The eastern half of

416-504: The Baltic Sea occurs for around a decade, the breeding of cod becomes endangered. Political control of Øresund has been an important issue in Danish and Swedish history. Denmark maintained military control with the coastal fortress of Kronborg at Elsinore on the west side and Kärnan at Helsingborg on the east, until the eastern shore was ceded to Sweden in 1658, based on the Treaty of Roskilde . Both fortresses are located where

442-568: The Belts. The Great Belt was historically navigable to ocean-going vessels. It still is used, despite a few collisions and near collisions with the Great Belt Bridge . The Danish navy monitors maritime traffic in the waters around the Great Belt. In the reign of king Eric of Pomerania the Danish government began to receive a large part of its income from the so-called ' Sound Dues ' toll on international merchant ships passing through

468-478: The Great Belt is an international waterway , legally based on the 1857 Copenhagen Convention . The western half of the Great Belt (between Funen and Sprogø ) and all other parts of the Danish straits are Danish territorial waters and subject to Danish jurisdiction. In 1991, Finland instituted proceedings before the International Court of Justice against Denmark, which was planning to build

494-502: The far less salty Baltic Sea . As the Kattegat in the north has almost oceanic conditions and the Baltic Sea (around 7 PSU, in its main basin) has brackish water, Øresund's water conditions are rather unusual and shifting. The streams are very complex, but the surface stream is often northbound (from the Baltic Sea) which gives a lower surface salinity, though streams can change from one day to another. The average surface salinity

520-460: The largest island) or a part of Zealand. Amager has eight connections with Zealand (two street bridges, a road bridge, a motorway bridge, a dual-track railway tunnel, an underground metro and a bicycle bridge) as well as a combined motorway and dual track railway to Scania and Sweden. Øresund, like other Danish and Danish-German straits, is at the border between oceanic salt water (which has a salinity of more than 30 PSU or per mille by weight) and

546-448: The little tide that still remains. The current has a much stronger effect than the tide on the water level, but strong winds may also affect the water level. During exceptional conditions, such as storms and hurricanes, oceanic water may suddenly flow into the Baltic Sea at all depths. Such events give deep waters in the southern Baltic Sea higher salinity, which makes it possible for cod to breed there. If no such inflow of oceanic water to

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572-454: The name is øre "gravel/sand beach", and the second part is sund , i.e. "sound, strait". The name is first attested on a runestone dated to ca. AD 1000, where it is written as ura suti , read as Old East Norse /øːrasundi/ (the dative case). The Old West Norse (and modern Icelandic ) form of the name is Eyrarsund . Ør is the modern form of the old Norse word (aur) meaning a gravel beach or shoal (see also ayre ), often forming

598-545: The sea to break through the Dana River forming the Great Belt as a proper seaway. In the processes the Ancylus Lake became the Littorina Sea as salt water entered the Baltic depression. The Great Belt is home to some popular fish: flatfish , sea trout , Atlantic cod , Atlantic mackerel and garfish , which are fished avidly for sport and for sale. A large and rising population of harbour porpoises lives in

624-512: The smaller peninsula north of Helsingborg , known as Kullahalvön . In the south, the boundary towards the Baltic Sea starts at Stevns Klint , at the westernmost peak of the peninsula just south of Køge Bay , Stevns Peninsula to Falsterbo at the Falsterbo peninsula. Its eastern boundary is the Swedish coastline; to the west Amager may be considered part of Øresund (in which case it is

650-670: The strait is 4 kilometres wide. In 1429, King Eric of Pomerania introduced the Sound Dues which remained in effect for more than four centuries, until 1857. Transitory dues on the use of waterways, roads, bridges and crossings were then an accepted way of taxing which could constitute a great part of a state's income. The Strait Dues remained the most important source of income for the Danish Crown for several centuries, thus making Danish kings relatively independent of Denmark's privy council and aristocracy . To be independent of

676-562: The Øresund, Sweden carried out two great projects: the foundation of Gothenburg in 1621 and the construction of the Göta Canal from 1810 to 1832. The Copenhagen Convention of 1857 abolished the Dues and made the Danish straits an international waterway . A fixed connection was opened across the strait in 2000, the Øresund Bridge . Great Belt The Great Belt ( Danish : Storebælt , pronounced [ˈstoːɐˌpelˀt] )

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