A French north pole expe­di­ti­on was ter­mi­na­ted by the Sys­sel­man­nen in Duvefjord on Nord­aus­t­land. The adven­tu­r­ers Gil­les and Ale­xia Elka­im had plan­ned a voya­ge simi­lar to that of Fri­dt­jof Nan­sen and his ship Fram in 1893-96 with their sai­ling boat Ark­ti­ka. Their plan was to sail into the Nor­the­ast Pas­sa­ge and to let the boat free­ze in the ice near the New Sibe­ri­an Islands to then drift with the ice across the Arc­tic Oce­an. A sledge jour­ney to the pole its­elf was part of the plan of the expe­di­ti­on, which was sche­du­led to last for seve­ral years.

Now the expe­di­ti­on has come to a pre­ma­tu­re end in Spits­ber­gen. Bad wea­ther, ice and engi­ne pro­blems had forced the Ark­ti­ka to return to Nord­aus­t­land, after they had left alre­a­dy Kvi­tøya, hea­ding fur­ther east. The ship was brought into Duvefjord on the north coast of Nord­aus­t­land to seek shel­ter from the wea­ther. Accor­ding to the expedition’s own blog, the situa­ti­on was dif­fi­cult at times due to the wea­ther. Due to the late sea­son and the need for fur­ther repairs, it was then deci­ded to win­ter in Duvefjord.

Per­mis­si­on for a win­tering had, howe­ver, not been obtai­ned and such per­mis­si­ons are not issued on a short war­ning. Cap­tain Elka­im appli­ed for per­mis­si­on from the Sys­sel­man­nen on Octo­ber 08. The result was a heli­c­op­ter visit with offi­ci­als who con­fis­ca­ted crew pass­ports and papers. During the fol­lo­wing days the Ark­ti­ka was towed to Lon­gye­ar­by­en. Aut­ho­ri­ties sta­te tech­ni­cal and legal reasons for this. The expe­di­ti­on mem­bers, howe­ver, wri­te on their Face­book site that the situa­ti­on in Duvefjord had been under con­trol, that the­re was no neces­si­ty for being towed and that the strong winds made this ope­ra­ti­on actual­ly rather dan­ge­rous. On the other hand, they thank the crew on Polar­sys­sel for their fri­end­ly and pro­fes­sio­nal hand­ling of the situa­ti­on. At the same time, Nor­we­gi­an aut­ho­ri­ties are accu­sed, among­st others for cruel­ty to ani­mals becau­se the 7 expe­di­ti­on dogs have not been allo­wed on shore in Lon­gye­ar­by­en for 10 days, alt­hough the local vet has repor­ted good health and vac­ci­na­ti­ons as nee­ded. The expe­di­ti­on claims to have appli­ed for per­mis­si­on to take dogs to Sval­bard alre­a­dy in July wit­hout get­ting a rep­ly from the aut­ho­ri­ties.

The legal situa­ti­on and fol­low-up may keep lawy­ers on both sides busy for a while. Mean­while, the expe­di­ti­on has come to an ear­ly and unin­ten­ded end, be it preli­mi­na­ry or final.

The French boat Ark­ti­ka does not have any­thing to do with the boats Arc­ti­ca I and Arc­ti­ca II from Lon­gye­ar­by­en.

Sources: Web­sei­te and Face­book­sei­te of the Ark­ti­ka-Expe­di­ti­on, The Inde­pen­dent Barents Obser­ver.

Tem­pe­ra­tu­re record from the wea­ther any­whe­re in the world, espe­ci­al­ly from the arc­tic, are get­ting more and more com­mon the­se days. On Fri­day (Octo­ber 07), the wea­ther sta­ti­on at the air­port near Lon­gye­ar­by­en recor­ded 10.1 degrees (C). This was the first time a value hig­her than 10 degrees was rea­ched in any Octo­ber sin­ce tem­pe­ra­tu­re recor­ding star­ted. The hig­hest Octo­ber tem­pe­ra­tu­re so far had been 8.9 degrees, mea­su­red in 1984. In 1961, 9.9 degrees were recor­ded. Back then, the wea­ther sta­ti­on was in Lon­gye­ar­by­en its­elf and not near the air­port (which did not exist back then) and dif­fe­rent mea­su­ring devices were used. The values can, accor­din­gly, not be com­pared direct­ly. Espe­ci­al­ly the dif­fe­rent loca­ti­on, though only a few kilo­me­t­res apart, may make a signi­fi­cant dif­fe­rent. The loca­ti­ons, near the shore of the lar­ge, open Isfjord or in Lon­gye­ar­by­en which is situa­ted in a val­ley, are meteo­ro­lo­gi­cal­ly quite dif­fe­rent.

Very impres­si­ve is ano­ther bit of infor­ma­ti­on, which is easi­ly get­ting over­loo­ked and lost in a sub-clau­se: the curr­ent­ly last time that a month was col­der than the month­ly long-term avera­ge was in Novem­ber 2010, sad 6 years ago.

The ice situa­ti­on around Spits­ber­gen is curr­ent­ly also rather sad. It has been sug­gested that last year’s poor sea ice con­di­ti­ons were lin­ked to the El Nino phe­no­me­non, which was strong then in the south Paci­fic, with glo­bal con­se­quen­ces for wea­ther and sea curr­ents. The­re has, so far, not been any impro­ve­ment regar­ding the sea ice near Spits­ber­gen.

Source: Nord­lys

Micha­el Engelhard’s new book Ice Bear. The Cul­tu­ral Histo­ry of an Arc­tic Icon is about to be released in Novem­ber. It throws light on the king of the arc­tic seen from a cul­tu­ral histo­ry per­spec­ti­ve and sure­ly deser­ves to be announ­ced here with this descrip­ti­on with is writ­ten and com­pi­led by its aut­hor.

Ice Bear
The Cul­tu­ral Histo­ry of an Arc­tic Icon

By MICHA­EL ENGEL­HARD

NATU­RAL HISTO­RY
288 pp., 170 illus., 145 in color, 8 x 10 in. $29.95 paper­back, Novem­ber 2016

Prime Arc­tic pre­da­tor and nomad of the sea ice and tun­dra, the polar bear endu­res as a source of won­der, ter­ror, and fasci­na­ti­on. Humans have seen it
as spi­rit gui­de and fan­ged ene­my, as trade good and moral meta­phor, as food source and sym­bol of eco­lo­gi­cal cri­sis. Eight thousand years of arti­facts attest to its cha­ris­ma, and to the fraught rela­ti­onships bet­ween our two spe­ci­es. In the White Bear, we ack­now­ledge the magic of wild­ness: it is both genui­ne­ly its­elf and a screen for our ima­gi­na­ti­on.

Ice Bear traces and illu­mi­na­tes this intert­wi­ned histo­ry. From Inu­it shamans to Jean Har­low loung­ing on a bears­kin rug, from the cubs trai­ned to pull sleds toward the North Pole to cuddly super­star Knut, it all comes to life in the­se pages. With meti­cu­lous rese­arch and more than 160 illus­tra­ti­ons, the aut­hor brings into focus this powerful and elu­si­ve ani­mal. Doing so, he del­ves into the sto­ries we tell about Nature—and about ourselves—hoping for a future in which such tales still mat­ter.

MICHA­EL ENGEL­HARD works as a wil­der­ness gui­de in Arc­tic Alas­ka and holds an MA in cul­tu­ral anthro­po­lo­gy from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Alas­ka Fair­banks. His books include a recent essay coll­ec­tion, Ame­ri­can Wild: Explo­ra­ti­ons from the Grand Can­yon to the Arc­tic Oce­an. His wri­ting has also appeared in Sier­ra, Out­side, Audu­bon, Natio­nal Wild­life, Natio­nal Parks, High Coun­try News, and the San Fran­cis­co Chro­nic­le.

“Engelhard’s thought-pro­vo­king ico­no­gra­phy explo­res in depth the multi­tu­de of cul­tu­ral roles play­ed by the polar bear.”
—David Fox, Ancho­ra­ge Press

“Engel­hard wea­ves tog­e­ther the dis­pa­ra­te pie­ces of our eclec­tic social and cul­tu­ral fasci­na­ti­on with polar bears. A tapestry of images reve­als our com­plex attach­ment to this Arc­tic icon.”
—Andrew Dero­cher, aut­hor of Polar Bears: A Com­ple­te Gui­de to their Bio­lo­gy and Beha­vi­or

Source: Micha­el Engel­hard

Coal mining has always been an important part of Lon­gye­ar­by­en, though of decre­asing importance today. The signi­fi­can­ce of coal mining is imme­dia­te­ly visi­ble for every visi­tor to Lon­gye­ar­by­en, as old coal mines can be seen in many places near Lon­gye­ar­by­en. Some of the­se old mines, such as mine 2B abo­ve Nyby­en, local­ly known as jule­n­is­se­gruve (San­ta Claus mine), are popu­lar sites for walks both for locals and visi­tors. The old mining instal­la­ti­ons are inte­res­t­ing, often with scenic views, and fasci­na­ting for pho­to­graph­ers.

The oppor­tu­ni­ties have recent­ly been great­ly redu­ced. Parts of the roof of a con­vey­or belt of mine 6 in Advent­da­len have col­lap­sed and the who­le mining faci­li­ty at mine 6 has been clo­sed to the public.
It is said that it will be made acces­si­ble again after dan­ge­rous parts have been remo­ved or secu­red. Lar­ge parts are still int­act. But the­re is curr­ent­ly no time plan and nobo­dy can say when the mine will be ope­ned again for visi­tors. The dif­fi­cult eco­no­mic situa­ti­on of the mining com­pa­ny, Store Nor­ske Spits­ber­gen Kul­kom­pa­ni, does not make it easier. At least ever­y­bo­dy invol­ved is awa­re of the high his­to­ri­cal and tou­ristic value of the old mining instal­la­ti­ons, which are part­ly pro­tec­ted as part of the cul­tu­ral heri­ta­ge. This means that seve­ral aut­ho­ri­ties have to be invol­ved in any work to clean up or secu­re the mines, some­thing that is unli­kely to speed up the pro­cess.

Curr­ent­ly, mine 1A (“Ame­ri­can mine”, abo­ve the church), 2B (“San­ta Claus mine”, abo­ve Nyby­en), 5 (End­a­len) and 6 (bet­ween Toda­len and Bol­terd­a­len) are clo­sed until fur­ther noti­ce.

At least, mine 3 is curr­ent­ly acces­si­ble as a muse­um for gui­ded groups.

Source: Sval­bard­pos­ten