The name Mediterranean comes from the Latin mare medi terra and means sea in the middle of the land. This almost closed intracontinental sea indeed extends between the three continents of Europe, Africa, and Asia. It covers an area of about 965,255 square miles (2.5 million km²) and opens to the Atlantic Ocean through the Strait of Gibraltar, which is only 8.7 miles (14 km) wide. The Mediterranean Sea has an average depth of 4,921 ft (1,500 m), and its deepest point recorded is 16,801 ft (5,121 m) at the bottom of the Matapan Trench. While the Mediterranean appears as a single sea, it is, in fact, divided into two basins by shoals between Sicily and Tunisia that separate it into the Western Mediterranean and the Eastern Mediterranean.