1.
NASA
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President Dwight D. Eisenhower established NASA in 1958 with a distinctly civilian orientation encouraging peaceful applications in space science. The National Aeronautics and Space Act was passed on July 29,1958, disestablishing NASAs predecessor, the new agency became operational on October 1,1958. Since that time, most US space exploration efforts have led by NASA, including the Apollo Moon landing missions, the Skylab space station. Currently, NASA is supporting the International Space Station and is overseeing the development of the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, the agency is also responsible for the Launch Services Program which provides oversight of launch operations and countdown management for unmanned NASA launches. NASA shares data with various national and international such as from the Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite. Since 2011, NASA has been criticized for low cost efficiency, from 1946, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics had been experimenting with rocket planes such as the supersonic Bell X-1. In the early 1950s, there was challenge to launch a satellite for the International Geophysical Year. An effort for this was the American Project Vanguard, after the Soviet launch of the worlds first artificial satellite on October 4,1957, the attention of the United States turned toward its own fledgling space efforts. This led to an agreement that a new federal agency based on NACA was needed to conduct all non-military activity in space. The Advanced Research Projects Agency was created in February 1958 to develop technology for military application. On July 29,1958, Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act, a NASA seal was approved by President Eisenhower in 1959. Elements of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency and the United States Naval Research Laboratory were incorporated into NASA, earlier research efforts within the US Air Force and many of ARPAs early space programs were also transferred to NASA. In December 1958, NASA gained control of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA has conducted many manned and unmanned spaceflight programs throughout its history. Some missions include both manned and unmanned aspects, such as the Galileo probe, which was deployed by astronauts in Earth orbit before being sent unmanned to Jupiter, the experimental rocket-powered aircraft programs started by NACA were extended by NASA as support for manned spaceflight. This was followed by a space capsule program, and in turn by a two-man capsule program. This goal was met in 1969 by the Apollo program, however, reduction of the perceived threat and changing political priorities almost immediately caused the termination of most of these plans. NASA turned its attention to an Apollo-derived temporary space laboratory, to date, NASA has launched a total of 166 manned space missions on rockets, and thirteen X-15 rocket flights above the USAF definition of spaceflight altitude,260,000 feet. The X-15 was an NACA experimental rocket-powered hypersonic research aircraft, developed in conjunction with the US Air Force, the design featured a slender fuselage with fairings along the side containing fuel and early computerized control systems
2.
Vancouver Island
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Vancouver Island is in the northeastern Pacific Ocean, just off the coast of Canada. It is part of the Canadian province of British Columbia, the island is 460 kilometres in length,100 kilometres in width at its widest point, and 32,134 km2 in area. It is the largest island on the West Coast of North America and this area has one of the warmest climates in Canada, and since the mid-1990s has been mild enough in a few areas to grow subtropical Mediterranean crops such as olives and lemons. Vancouver Island has a population of 759,366 according to the Canada 2011 Census, nearly half of that figure live in the metropolitan area of Greater Victoria. Other notable cities and towns on Vancouver Island include Nanaimo, Port Alberni, Parksville, Courtenay, and Campbell River. Victoria, the city of British Columbia, is located on the island. Vancouver Island has been the homeland to many indigenous peoples for thousands of years, the island was explored by British and Spanish expeditions in the late 18th century. Quadras name was dropped from the name. It is one of several North American locations named after George Vancouver, Vancouver Island is the worlds 43rd largest island, Canadas 11th largest island, and Canadas second most populous island after the Island of Montreal. It is the largest Pacific island anywhere east of New Zealand, Vancouver Island has been the homeland to many indigenous peoples for thousands of years. The groupings, by language, are the Kwakwakawakw, Nuu-chah-nulth and their cultures are connected to the natural resources abundant in the area. The Kwakwakawakw today number about 5,500, who live in British Columbia on northern Vancouver Island and they are also known as Kwakiutl in English, from one of their tribes, but they prefer their autonym Kwakwakawakw. Their indigenous language, part of the Wakashan family, is Kwakwala, the name Kwakwakawakw means speakers of Kwakwala. The language is now spoken by less than 5% of the population—about 250 people, today 17 separate tribes make up the Kwakwakawakw. Some Kwakwakawakw groups are now extinct, Kwakwala is a Northern Wakashan language, a grouping shared with Haisla, Heiltsuk and Wuikyala. The Nuu-chah-nulth are indigenous peoples in Canada and their traditional home is on the west coast of Vancouver Island. The Nuu-chah-nulth speak a Southern Wakashan language and are related to the Makah of the Olympic Peninsula, Washington State. The Coast Salish are the largest of the southern groups and they are a loose grouping of many tribes with numerous distinct cultures and languages
3.
John Webber
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John Webber RA was an English artist who accompanied Captain Cook on his third Pacific expedition. He is best known for his images of Australasia, Hawaii, Webber was born in London, educated in Bern and studied painting at Paris. His father was Abraham Wäber, a Swiss sculptor who had moved to London, Webber served as official artist on James Cooks third voyage of discovery around the Pacific aboard HMS Resolution. At Adventure Bay in January 1777 he did drawings of A Man of Van Diemens Land and he also did many drawings of scenes in New Zealand and the South Sea islands. On this voyage, during which Cook lost his life in a fight in Hawaii, Webber became the first European artist to make contact with Hawaii and he made numerous watercolor landscapes of the islands of Kauai and Hawaii, and also portrayed many of the Hawaiian people. In April 1778, Captain Cooks ships Resolution and Discovery anchored at Ship Cove, now known as Nootka Sound, Vancouver Island, the crew took observations and recorded encounters with the local people. Webber made watercolour landscapes including Resolution and Discovery in Ship Cove,1778 and his drawings and paintings were engraved for British Admiraltys account of the expedition, which was published in 1784. Back in England in 1780 Webber exhibited around 50 works at Royal Academy exhibitions between 1784 and 1792, and was elected an associate of the Royal Academy in 1785, most of his work were landscapes. Sometimes figures were included as in A Party from H. M. S, Resolution shooting sea horses, which was shown at the academy in 1784, and his The Death of Captain Cook became well known through an engraving of it. Another version of this picture is in the William Dixson gallery at Sydney and his Young Woman of the Sandwich Islands is in San Antonio Museum of Art. Biography at the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online
4.
Sound (geography)
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In geography, a sound is a large sea or ocean inlet larger than a bay, deeper than a bight, and wider than a fjord, or a narrow sea or ocean channel between two bodies of land. There is little consistency in the use of sound in English-language place names, a sound is often formed by the seas flooding a river valley. This produces a long inlet where the sloping valley hillsides descend to sea-level, the Marlborough Sounds in New Zealand are a good example of this type of formation. Sometimes a sound is produced by a glaciers carving out a valley on a coast then receding, the glacier produces a sound that often has steep, near vertical sides that extend deep under water. The sea floor is flat and deeper at the landward end than the seaward end. This type of sound is more properly termed a fjord, the sounds in Fiordland, New Zealand, have been formed this way. A sound generally connotes a protected anchorage, in the more general northern European usage, a sound is a strait or the most narrow part of a strait. In Scandinavia and around the Baltic Sea, there are more than a hundred straits named Sund and it is also a colloquial short name, among others, for Plymouth Sound, England. Pamlico Sound is a lagoon that lies between North Carolina and its barrier beaches, the Outer Banks, in a similar situation. The Mississippi Sound separates the Gulf of Mexico from the mainland, along much of the coasts of Alabama. On the West Coast, Puget Sound, by contrast, is an arm of the ocean. The term sound is derived from the Anglo-Saxon or Old Norse word sund, the word sund is already documented in Old Norse and Old English as meaning gap. This suggests a relation to verbs meaning to separate, such as absondern and aussondern, söndra, sondre, as well as the English noun sin, German Sünde, English has also the adjective asunder and the noun sundry, and Swedish has the adjective sönder. In Swedish and in both Norwegian languages, sund is the term for any strait. In Swedish and Nynorsk, it is part of names worldwide, such as in Swedish Berings sund and Gibraltar sund. The Malampaya Natural Gas Project is named after this area because it is close to it, george Sound in Appalachicola Bay, Florida St
5.
Pacific Ocean
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The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of the Earths oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south and is bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, the Mariana Trench in the western North Pacific is the deepest point in the world, reaching a depth of 10,911 metres. Both the center of the Water Hemisphere and the Western Hemisphere are in the Pacific Ocean, the oceans current name was coined by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan during the Spanish circumnavigation of the world in 1521, as he encountered favourable winds on reaching the ocean. He called it Mar Pacífico, which in both Portuguese and Spanish means peaceful sea, important human migrations occurred in the Pacific in prehistoric times. Long-distance trade developed all along the coast from Mozambique to Japan, trade, and therefore knowledge, extended to the Indonesian islands but apparently not Australia. By at least 878 when there was a significant Islamic settlement in Canton much of trade was controlled by Arabs or Muslims. In 219 BC Xu Fu sailed out into the Pacific searching for the elixir of immortality, from 1404 to 1433 Zheng He led expeditions into the Indian Ocean. The east side of the ocean was discovered by Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa in 1513 after his expedition crossed the Isthmus of Panama and he named it Mar del Sur because the ocean was to the south of the coast of the isthmus where he first observed the Pacific. Later, Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan sailed the Pacific East to West on a Castilian expedition of world circumnavigation starting in 1519, Magellan called the ocean Pacífico because, after sailing through the stormy seas off Cape Horn, the expedition found calm waters. The ocean was often called the Sea of Magellan in his honor until the eighteenth century, sailing around and east of the Moluccas, between 1525 and 1527, Portuguese expeditions discovered the Caroline Islands, the Aru Islands, and Papua New Guinea. In 1542–43 the Portuguese also reached Japan, in 1564, five Spanish ships consisting of 379 explorers crossed the ocean from Mexico led by Miguel López de Legazpi and sailed to the Philippines and Mariana Islands. The Manila galleons operated for two and a half centuries linking Manila and Acapulco, in one of the longest trade routes in history, Spanish expeditions also discovered Tuvalu, the Marquesas, the Cook Islands, the Solomon Islands, and the Admiralty Islands in the South Pacific. In the 16th and 17th century Spain considered the Pacific Ocean a Mare clausum—a sea closed to other naval powers, as the only known entrance from the Atlantic the Strait of Magellan was at times patrolled by fleets sent to prevent entrance of non-Spanish ships. On the western end of the Pacific Ocean the Dutch threatened the Spanish Philippines, Spain also sent expeditions to the Pacific Northwest reaching Vancouver Island in southern Canada, and Alaska. The French explored and settled Polynesia, and the British made three voyages with James Cook to the South Pacific and Australia, Hawaii, and the North American Pacific Northwest, one of the earliest voyages of scientific exploration was organized by Spain in the Malaspina Expedition of 1789–1794. It sailed vast areas of the Pacific, from Cape Horn to Alaska, Guam and the Philippines, New Zealand, Australia, and the South Pacific. Growing imperialism during the 19th century resulted in the occupation of much of Oceania by other European powers, and later, Japan, in Oceania, France got a leading position as imperial power after making Tahiti and New Caledonia protectorates in 1842 and 1853 respectively. After navy visits to Easter Island in 1875 and 1887, Chilean navy officer Policarpo Toro managed to negotiate an incorporation of the island into Chile with native Rapanui in 1888, by occupying Easter Island, Chile joined the imperial nations
6.
Provinces and territories of Canada
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Canadas geography is divided into administrative divisions known as provinces and territories that are responsible for delivery of sub-national governance. Over its history, Canadas international borders have changed several times, the ten provinces are Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Quebec, and Saskatchewan. Several of the provinces were former British colonies, Quebec was originally a French colony, the three territories are Northwest Territories, Nunavut, and Yukon, which govern the rest of the area of the former British North America. Together, the provinces and territories make up the worlds second-largest country by area, the powers flowing from the Constitution Act are divided between the federal government and the provincial governments to exercise exclusively. In modern Canadian constitutional theory, the provinces are considered to be co-sovereign divisions, the territories are not sovereign, but simply part of the federal realm, and have a commissioner who represents the federal government. Notes, There are three territories in Canada, unlike the provinces, the territories of Canada have no inherent sovereignty and have only those powers delegated to them by the federal government. They include all of mainland Canada north of latitude 60° north and west of Hudson Bay, the following table lists the territories in order of precedence. Prior to Confederation, Ontario and Quebec were united as the Province of Canada, over the following years, Manitoba, British Columbia, and Prince Edward Island were added as provinces. The Hudsons Bay Company controlled large swathes of western Canada referred to as Ruperts Land and the North-Western Territory until 1870, subsequently, the area was re-organized into the province of Manitoba and the Northwest Territories. The remaining Arctic islands were transferred by Britain to Canada in 1880,1898 saw the Yukon Territory, later renamed simply as Yukon, carved from the parts of the Northwest Territories surrounding the Klondike gold fields. On September 1,1905, a portion of the Northwest Territories south of the 60th parallel north became the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan. In 1912, the boundaries of Quebec, Ontario and Manitoba were expanded northward, Manitobas to the 60° parallel, Ontarios to Hudson Bay, in 1907, Newfoundland acquired dominion status. In the middle of the Great Depression in Canada with Newfoundland facing a period of economic crisis. In 2001, it was officially renamed Newfoundland and Labrador, in 1903, the Alaska Panhandle Dispute fixed British Columbias northwestern boundary. This was one of two provinces in Canadian history to have its size reduced. In 1999, Nunavut was created from the portion of the Northwest Territories. Yukon lies in the portion of The North, while Nunavut is in the east. All three territories combined are the most sparsely populated region in Canada, covering 3,921,739 km2 in land area and they are often referred to as a single region, The North, for organisational and economic purposes
7.
British Columbia
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British Columbia is the westernmost province of Canada, with a population of more than four million people located between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. British Columbia is also a component of the Pacific Northwest and the Cascadia bioregion, along with the U. S. states of Idaho, Oregon, Washington and Alaska. The first British settlement in the area was Fort Victoria, established in 1843, subsequently, on the mainland, the Colony of British Columbia was founded by Richard Clement Moody and the Royal Engineers, Columbia Detachment, in response to the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush. Port Moody is named after him, in 1866, Vancouver Island became part of the colony of British Columbia, and Victoria became the united colonys capital. In 1871, British Columbia became the province of Canada. Its Latin motto is Splendor sine occasu, the capital of British Columbia remains Victoria, the fifteenth-largest metropolitan region in Canada, named for the Queen who created the original European colonies. The largest city is Vancouver, the third-largest metropolitan area in Canada, the largest in Western Canada, in October 2013, British Columbia had an estimated population of 4,606,371. British Columbia evolved from British possessions that were established in what is now British Columbia by 1871, First Nations, the original inhabitants of the land, have a history of at least 10,000 years in the area. Today there are few treaties and the question of Aboriginal Title, notably, the Tsilhqotin Nation has established Aboriginal title to a portion of their territory, as a result of the recent Supreme Court of Canada decision. BCs economy is diverse, with service producing industries accounting for the largest portion of the provinces GDP and it is the endpoint of transcontinental railways, and the site of major Pacific ports that enable international trade. Though less than 5% of its vast 944,735 km2 land is arable and its climate encourages outdoor recreation and tourism, though its economic mainstay has long been resource extraction, principally logging, farming, and mining. Vancouver, the provinces largest city and metropolitan area, also serves as the headquarters of many western-based natural resource companies and it also benefits from a strong housing market and a per capita income well above the national average. The Northern Interior region has a climate with very cold winters. The climate of Vancouver is by far the mildest winter climate of the major Canadian cities, the provinces name was chosen by Queen Victoria, when the Colony of British Columbia, i. e. the Mainland, became a British colony in 1858. The current southern border of British Columbia was established by the 1846 Oregon Treaty, British Columbias land area is 944,735 square kilometres. British Columbias rugged coastline stretches for more than 27,000 kilometres and it is the only province in Canada that borders the Pacific Ocean. British Columbias capital is Victoria, located at the tip of Vancouver Island. Only a narrow strip of the Island, from Campbell River to Victoria, is significantly populated, much of the western part of Vancouver Island and the rest of the coast is covered by thick, tall and sometimes impenetrable temperate rainforest
8.
James Cook
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Captain James Cook FRS RN was a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the Royal Navy. Cook joined the British merchant navy as a teenager and joined the Royal Navy in 1755 and he saw action in the Seven Years War, and subsequently surveyed and mapped much of the entrance to the Saint Lawrence River during the siege of Quebec. This helped bring Cook to the attention of the Admiralty and Royal Society, in three voyages Cook sailed thousands of miles across largely uncharted areas of the globe. He mapped lands from New Zealand to Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean in greater detail, as he progressed on his voyages of discovery he surveyed and named features, and recorded islands and coastlines on European maps for the first time. He displayed a combination of seamanship, superior surveying and cartographic skills, physical courage, Cook was attacked and killed while attempting to kidnap the native chief of Hawaii during his third exploratory voyage in the Pacific in 1779. He left a legacy of scientific and geographical knowledge which was to influence his successors well into the 20th century, and numerous memorials worldwide have been dedicated to him. James Cook was born on 7 November 1728 in the village of Marton in Yorkshire and baptised on 14 November in the church of St Cuthbert. He was the second of eight children of James Cook, a Scottish farm labourer from Ednam in Roxburghshire, in 1736, his family moved to Airey Holme farm at Great Ayton, where his fathers employer, Thomas Skottowe, paid for him to attend the local school. In 1741, after five years schooling, he work for his father. For leisure, he would climb a hill, Roseberry Topping, enjoying the opportunity for solitude. Cooks Cottage, his parents last home, which he is likely to have visited, is now in Melbourne, having moved from England and reassembled, brick by brick. In 1745, when he was 16, Cook moved 20 miles to the village of Staithes. Historians have speculated that this is where Cook first felt the lure of the sea while gazing out of the shop window. After 18 months, not proving suitable for work, Cook travelled to the nearby port town of Whitby to be introduced to friends of Sandersons, John. The Walkers, who were Quakers, were prominent local ship-owners in the coal trade and their house is now the Captain Cook Memorial Museum. Cook was taken on as a merchant navy apprentice in their fleet of vessels. His first assignment was aboard the collier Freelove, and he spent several years on this and various other coasters, sailing between the Tyne and London. As part of his apprenticeship, Cook applied himself to the study of algebra, geometry, trigonometry, navigation and his three-year apprenticeship completed, Cook began working on trading ships in the Baltic Sea
9.
Nuu-chah-nulth
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The Nuu-chah-nulth, also formerly referred to as the Nootka, Nutka, Aht, Nuuchahnulth or Tahkaht, are one of the Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast in Canada. The term Nuu-chah-nulth is used to describe fifteen related tribes whose traditional home is on the west coast of Vancouver Island, the Nuu-chah-nulth are related to the Kwakwakawakw, the Haisla, and the Nitinaht. The Nuu-chah-nulth language is part of the Wakashan language group, the Makah people in northwest Washington were historically also Wakashan speakers. When James Cook first encountered the villagers at Yuquot in 1778, Cook interpreted this as the natives name for the inlet—now called Nootka Sound. The term was applied to the indigenous inhabitants of the area. In 1978 the tribes of western Vancouver Island chose the term Nuu-chah-nulth and this was the culmination of the 1967 alliance forged among these tribes in order to present a unified political voice to the levels of government and European-Canadian society. The Makah of northwest Washington, located on the Olympic Peninsula in their own reservation, are related to the Nuu-chah-nulth. The Nuu-chah-nulth were among the first Pacific peoples north of California to encounter Europeans, competition between Spain and the United Kingdom over control of Nootka Sound led to a bitter international dispute around 1790, called the Nootka Crisis. It was settled under the Nootka Conventions of the 1790s, when Spain agreed to abandon its claims to the North Pacific coast. Negotiations to settle the dispute were handled under the aegis and hospitality of Maquinna, a few years later, Maquinna and his warriors captured the American trading ship Boston in March 1803. He and his men killed the captain and all the crew, after gaining release, John R. Jewitt wrote a classic captivity narrative about his nearly 3 years with the Nuu-chah-nulth and his reluctant assimilation to their society. This 1815 book is entitled Narrative of the Adventures and Sufferings of John R, in 1811 the trading ship Tonquin was blown up in Clayoquot Sound. Tla-o-qui-aht and his warriors had attacked the ship in revenge for an insult by the ships captain, the captain and almost all the crew were killed and the ship abandoned. The next day warriors reboarded the empty ship to salvage it, however, a hiding crew member set fire to the ships magazine and the resulting explosion killed many natives. Only one crew member, a pilot / interpreter hired from the nearby Quinault nation, from earliest contact with European explorers up until 1830, more than 90% of the Nuu-chah-nulth died as a result of infectious disease epidemics, particularly malaria and smallpox. Europeans carried these endemic diseases but the First Nations had no immunity to them, the high rate of deaths added to the social disruption and cultural turmoil resulting from contact with Westerners. In the early 20th century, the population was estimated at 3,500, total population for the 13 tribes in the Nuuchahnulth nation is 8,147, according to the Nuuchahnulth Tribal Council Indian Registry of February 2006. The Ditidaht First Nation, while politically and culturally affiliated with the Nuu-chah-nulth, are referred to
10.
Spanish Navy
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The Spanish Navy, is the maritime branch of the Spanish Armed Forces and one of the oldest active naval forces in the world. Reform under the Bourbon dynasty improved its logistical and military capacity in the 18th century, currently, the Spanish Armada is the third largest navy in Europe, after the British Royal Navy and the French Navy, and the sixth in the world ranking. The main bases of the Spanish Navy are located in Rota, Ferrol, San Fernando, the roots of the modern Spanish navy date back to before the unification of Spain. By the late Middle Ages, the two kingdoms that would later combine to form Spain, Aragon and Castile, had developed powerful fleets. Aragon possessed the third largest navy in the late medieval Mediterranean, although its capabilities were exceeded by those of Venice, in 1402, a Castilian expedition led by Juan de Bethencourt conquered the Canary Islands for Henry III of Castile. In the 15th century, Castile entered into a race of exploration with Portugal, in 1492, two caravels and a carrack, commanded by Christopher Columbus, arrived in America, on an expedition that sought a westward oceanic passage across the Atlantic, to the Far East. This began the era of trade routes, pioneered by the Spanish in the seas to the west of Europe. The navy also carried explorers to the North American mainland, including Juan Ponce de León and Álvarez de Pineda, in 1519, Spain sent out the first expedition of world circumnavigation in history, which was put in the charge of the Portuguese Commander Ferdinand Magellan. Following the death of Magellan in the Philippines, the expedition was completed under the command of Juan Sebastián Elcano in 1522, for two and a half centuries, the Manila galleons operated across the Pacific linking Manila and Acapulco. Until the early 17th century, the Pacific Ocean, aside from the Marianas and Caroline Islands, several naval expeditions also discovered the Tuvalu archipelago, the Marquesas, the Solomon Islands and New Guinea in the South Pacific. In the quest for Terra Australis, Spanish explorers in the 17th century also discovered the Pitcairn, most significantly, from 1565 Spanish fleets explored and colonised the Philippine archipelago, the Spanish East Indies. This arrangement continued until superseded by the decline of galley warfare during the 17th century, most notable of these attacks was the Battle of Gibraltar in 1607, in which a Dutch squadron destroyed a fleet of galleons at anchor in the confines of the bay. This naval war took on a dimension with actions in the Caribbean. In the 1580s, the conflict in the Netherlands drew England into war with Spain, the effort to neutralise this threat led to a disastrous attempt to invade England in 1588. This defeat led to a reform of fleet operations, the navy at this time was not a single operation but consisted of various fleets, made up mainly of armed merchantmen with escorts of royal ships. The Armada fiasco marked a point in naval warfare, where gunnery was now more important than ramming and boarding. During the 1590s, the expansion of these allowed a great increase in the overseas trade and massive increase in the importation of luxuries. Port defences at Cadiz were upgraded and all attempts to repeat the attack in the following centuries would fail, meanwhile, Spanish ships were able to step up operations in the English Channel, the North Sea and towards Ireland
