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There are 204 islands. They are located 950 km from the mouth of the Hooghly River , 193 km from Cape Negrais in Myanmar, the nearest point of the mainland, and 547 km from the northern extremity of Sumatra. The length of the island chain is 352 km and its greatest width is 51 km. The total land area of the Andamans is 6408 kmē.
The five chief islands over a distance of 251 km, are known collectively as "the great Andaman." These are from north to south: North Andaman, Middle Andaman, South Andaman, Baratang and Rutland Island. Four narrow straits part these islands: Austin Strait, between North and Middle Andaman; Homfray's Strait between Middle Andaman and Baratang, and the north extremity of South Andaman; Middle (or Andaman) Strait between Baratang and South Andaman; and Macpherson Strait between South Andaman and Rutland Island. Of these only the last is navigable by ocean-going vessels.
Together with the chief islands are, on the extreme North, Landfall Islands, separated by the navigable Cleugh Passage; Interview Island, separated by the navigable Interview Passage, off the West coast of the Middle Andaman; the Labyrinth Island off the southwest coast of the South Andaman, through which is the navigable Elphinstone Passage; Ritchie's (or the Andaman) Archipelago off the East coast of South Andaman and Baratang, separated by the wide and safe Diligent Strait and intersected by Kwangtung Strait and the Tadma Juru (Strait). Little Andaman, roughly 42 km. by 26, forms the southern extremity of the whole group and lies 50 km. South of Rutland Island across the Manners Strait, the main shipping route between the Andamans and the Madras coast. Besides these are a great number of islets lying off the shores of the main islands.
The principal outlying islands include the North Sentinel, a dangerous island of about 73 kmē, lying about 29 km. off the west coast of the South Andaman. About 29 km. west of the Andamans are the dangerous Western Banks and Dalrymple Bank, rising to within a few fathoms of the surface of the sea and forming, with the two Sentinel Islands, the tops of a line of submarine hills parallel to the Andamans.
114 km. northeast of Port Blair we find the remarkable marine volcano, Barren Island (351 m.), which became active again in 1991 after being quiescent for almost two centuries. The equally curious isolated mountain, the extinct volcano of Narcondam, rising 710 m. out of the sea, is 114 km. east of North Andaman. Also some 64 km. to the east is the Invisible Bank, with one rock just awash; and 55 km. southeast of Narcondam is a submarine hill rising to 689 m. below the surface of the sea. Narcondam, Barren Island and the Invisible Bank, a great danger of these seas, are in a line almost parallel to the Andamans inclining towards them from north to south.
The islands forming Great Andaman consist of a mass of hills enclosing very narrow valleys, the whole covered by dense tropical jungle. The hills rise, to a considerable elevation: the chief heights being in the North Andaman, Saddle Peak (732 m.); in the Middle Andaman, Mount Diavolo behind Cuthbert Bay (511 m.); in the South Andaman, Koiob (459 m.), Mount Harriet (364 m.) and the Cholunga range (324 m.); and in Rutland Island, Ford's Peak (433 m.). Little Andaman is practically flat. There are no rivers and few perennial streams in the islands. The whole of the Andamans and the outlying islands were completely surveyed topographically by the Indian Survey Department under Colonel Hobday in 1883- 1886, and the surrounding seas were charted by Commander Carpenter in 1888- 1889.
The coasts of the Andamans are deeply indented, giving existence to a number of safe harbours, which are often surrounded by mangrove swamps. The chief harbours are (starting northwards from Port Blair, the great harbour of South Andaman) on the East coast: Port Meadows, Colebrooke Passage, Elphinstone Harbour (Homfray's Strait), Stewart Sound and Port Cornwallis. The last three are very large. On the West coast: Temple Sound, Interview Passage, Port Anson or Kwangtung Harbour (large), Port Campbell (large), Port Mouat and Macpherson Strait. There are many other safe anchorages about the coast, notably Shoal Bay and Kotara Anchorage in South Andaman; Cadell Bay and the Turtle Islands in North Andaman; and Outram Harbour and Kwangtung Strait in the archipelago...
The Andaman Islands and the Nicobar Islands to the south form part of a range of submarine mountains, 1130 km. long, running from Cape Negrais in the Arakan Yoma range of Burma, to Achin Head in Sumatra. This range separates the Bay of Bengal from the Andaman Sea, and it contains much that is geologically characteristic of the Arakan Yoma,. The older rocks are early Tertiary or late Cretaceous. The newer rocks are in Ritchie's Archipelago chiefly, and contain fossils of radiolarians and foraminifera. There is coral along the coasts everywhere, and the Sentinel Islands are composed of the newer rocks with a superstructure of coral. A theory of a still continuing subsidence of the islands was formed by Kurz in 1866 and confirmed by Oldham in 1884. Signs of its continuance are found on the east coast in several places.
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