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The Turks and Caicos
Islands lie to the southeast of the Bahamas, and are just
90 miles to the north of Haiti. They lie between 21 and
22 degrees latitude, with the result that they enjoy a
subtropical climate with temperatures averaging 70 degrees
Fahrenheit in the winter period-December to March - and
over 80 degrees in the period |
April to November. The
islands are in the path of the annual hurricanes that develop
off the west coast of Africa and visit the Carribean Basin and
the southeast coastal area of the United States.
They consist of two groups of islands separated by a deep-water channel
about 22 miles wide with a depth of over 7000 feet, known as the Turks
Island Passage. The Turks Islands lie to the east of the passage and
the Caicos Islands to the west. The Turks Islands consist of two inhabited
islands, Grand Turk and Salt Cay and six uninhabited cays.
The Caicoses consist of six islands, four of which are inhabited. The
Caicos Islands form a bank - the Caicos Bank, with the islands separated
from one another by shallow passages. Altogether, both sets of islands
have a total land area of 366.11 sq miles or approximately 948.23 sq kilometers¹. The largest of all the islands
is Middle Caicos.
¹Source: Lands and Survey (as of December 2005)
