(Abbreviated ACC.) An eastward flowing current, also known as the West Wind Drift, that circles Antarctica and extends from the surface to the ocean floor. With a volume transport of 130 Sv (130 × 106 m3s−1) it is the largest of all ocean currents. Current speed in the ACC is comparatively modest (0.1 m s−1, but larger in fronts), the large transport being achieved by the current's great depth. Seventy-five percent of the transport occurs in the polar and subantarctic fronts that make up only 20% of the ACC area. Interannual variability is about 15% of the mean but can reach 40% on occasions. The ACC is influenced by bottom topography, which causes deflections from its general westward path and eddy formation, particularly at the Scotia Ridge, the Kerguelen Plateau, and the Macquarie Ridge. The eddies are instrumental for the poleward transport of heat across the current, which would otherwise block meridional heat transfer.

The westward flowing ocean current circling Antarctica, also known as the West Wind Drift. It is the largest ocean current on Earth (about three times the flow of the Gulf Stream). A branch comes up around the Campbell Plateau to the south of New Zealand.

the movement of shallow-to-deep Southern Ocean waters from west to east around the globe, circumnavigating Antarctica, in response to the rotation of the Earth and planetary winds. The current was first reported by James Cook in 1775. (See also panel in Currents of change, this issue.)