The polar bear in Lon­gye­ar­by­en (see pre­vious posts) is not in Lon­gye­ar­by­en any­mo­re. Today (Thurs­day, 16 Octo­ber) at 12.45 hours, it was seda­ted and then flown out to a remo­te part of Sval­bard. Befo­re the polar bear actual­ly fell asleep, it still wal­ked for about 3 kilo­me­t­res from the shore of Advent­fjord, whe­re it had been lying for a while, to the old nor­t­hern light obser­va­to­ry (at the old run­way) in Advent­da­len. After the usu­al weig­hing, mea­su­ring and mar­king, it was flown nor­thwards.

The Sys­sel­man­nen wants to get it as far away as pos­si­ble, pre­fer­a­b­ly to ano­ther island rather than the main island Spits­ber­gen. The exact place will, howe­ver, depend on the wea­ther during the flight. The initi­al­ly nor­t­her­ly direc­tion may, howe­ver, point to Nord­aus­t­land as a pos­si­ble new home for the bear. If it beco­mes simi­lar­ly faithful to a smal­ler area the­re as he did near Lon­gyear­ben, is some­thing nobo­dy can curr­ent­ly know, pro­ba­b­ly inclu­ding the polar bear its­elf.

A lar­ger num­ber of peo­p­le used the oppor­tu­ni­ty to get a glim­pse of the bear in a distance of about 540 met­res. For some, it was the first time to see a polar bear in the wild.

Source: http://svalbardposten.no/index.php?page=vis_nyhet&NyhetID=5128

Yes­ter­day (Wed­nes­day, 15 Octo­ber) a polar bear visi­ted Lon­gye­ar­by­en (see yesterday’s post here). The bear was final­ly dri­ven away by the Sys­sel­man­nen (poli­ce), who fol­lo­wed it seve­ral kilo­me­t­res by heli­c­op­ter to make sure it would return direct­ly.

But it did. Now, the polar bear is some­whe­re on the sea shore of Advent­fjord adja­cent to Advent­da­len, clo­se to Lon­gye­ar­by­en. Tog­e­ther with the Nor­we­gi­an Polar Insti­tu­te, the Sys­sel­man­nen is now pre­pa­ring an attempt to seda­te the polar bear and then fly out out to a remo­te loca­ti­on in the Spits­ber­gen archi­pe­la­go.

The Sys­sel­man­nen asks ever­y­bo­dy to stay away from the­re area until this has been done.

Source: Sys­sel­man­nen