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Labrador Current

The Labrador Current, famous for icebergs and once-abundant cod fish, is a southeasterly flow of water over the continental shelf and slope east of Newfoundland and Labrador, between Hudson Strait and the southern tip of the Grand Banks.

Labrador Current

The Labrador Current, famous for icebergs and once-abundant cod fish, is a southeasterly flow of water over the continental shelf and slope east of Newfoundland and Labrador, between Hudson Strait and the southern tip of the Grand Banks. About 80% of the flow is concentrated in a 50 km-wide, high-speed stream over the upper continental slope, where surface speeds up to 0.8 m/s have been recorded, in contrast to 0.1 - 0.2 m/s elsewhere in the current. The water, coming from Baffin and Hudson bays, Foxe Basin and the West Greenland Current, is colder (0.0°C) and contains less salt (.0334) than water of the deep ocean (4.0°C, .0347).