The­re have been regu­lar polar bear sightin­gs in Isfjord during the who­le sum­mer, both on the north side, from Trygg­ham­na to Ymer­buk­ta and Bore­buk­ta, in Bil­lefjord near Pyra­mi­den, but also near Lon­gye­ar­by­en.

This is an ongo­ing situa­ti­on: the­re have been seve­ral bear sightin­gs recent­ly not far from Lon­gye­ar­by­en, in Coles­da­len, Bjørn­da­len and Mälard­a­len. The bear(s) in Coles­da­len and Bjørn­da­len may be one and the same indi­vi­du­al, but the one seen in Mälard­a­len, on the north side of Advent­da­len and just a few kilo­me­t­res away from the sett­le­ment and road, is ano­ther indi­vi­du­al.

On Mon­day (16 Sep­tem­ber), a man had to fire a shot from insi­de a hut at Dia­ba­sod­den, about 20 kilo­me­t­res nor­the­ast of Lon­gye­ar­by­en, to sca­re a polar bear away. This work­ed well and then the Sys­sel­man­nen picked the man up by heli­c­op­ter to avo­id fur­ther risks.

All this shows that it is very important to take the risk of mee­ting polar bears very serious­ly, also in Longyearbyen’s near sur­roun­dings.

Polar bear in Hior­th­hamn clo­se to Lon­gye­ar­by­en (archi­ve image).

The local news­pa­per Sval­bard­pos­ten has a litt­le sur­vey every week and this time they asked what peo­p­le think about the incre­asing num­ber of polar bear sightin­gs near Lon­gye­ar­by­en. So far 790 peo­p­le have given their vote, which is a lot for the Sval­bard­pos­ten gal­lup. 500 voted for “we live on Sval­bard so we have to adjust”, but no less than 241 cho­se “it is time to dis­cuss hun­ting polar bears again”. The­se sur­veys are not repre­sen­ta­ti­ve and cer­tain­ly some­ti­mes the ques­ti­ons and the given ans­wers show an ele­ment of humour and sati­re, some­thing that may also be true for the votes that peo­p­le give. This may explain at least some of the many votes that ask for dis­cus­sing polar bear hun­ting again.

Polar bears were hun­ted inten­se­ly in Sval­bard until 1973. The recent increase in num­bers is, at least in part, still a reco­very from tho­se years when hun­ting polar bears was an indus­try.

The new Spits­ber­gen calen­dar 2020 is available now – for the first time, as a “2 in 1” dou­ble calen­dar. We just used the rear sides of the calen­dar pages that used to be white with older edi­ti­ons. So now we have, addi­tio­nal­ly to the 12 Spits­ber­gen images, ano­ther 12 stun­ning images which repre­sent the other cold end of the glo­be: Ant­ar­c­ti­ca.

Still, we have been able to keep the pri­ce sta­ble. And as befo­re, the dou­ble calen­dar “Spits­ber­gen & Ant­ar­c­ti­ca 2020” is available in two sizes: the lar­ger A3 for­mat fea­tures pro­min­ent­ly on the wall, while the smal­ler A5 is … well: smal­ler.

For fur­ther details or orde­ring, plea­se visit our online shop (click here).

Mal­mö in the ice The­re are 35 % less ice in the who­le Arc­tic Oce­an than usu­al (a term that will most likely have to be re-defi­ned soon), but in Sval­bard, ice con­di­ti­ons are more as they used to be in ear­lier years. This means that nor­the­as­tern parts of Nord­aus­t­land did not beco­me ice-free at all this sum­mer, and the­re is drift ice in sou­thern Hin­lo­pen Strait and south of Nord­aus­t­land.

The small pas­sen­ger ship Mal­mö got stuck in drift ice in sou­thern Hin­lo­pen Strait. The ship is stron­gly built and can tole­ra­te some ice, but the situa­ti­on beca­me poten­ti­al­ly dan­ge­rous when curr­ents moved the ice field towards shal­low waters in the area of Rønn­be­ckøya­ne, a group of small islands in sou­thern Hin­lo­pen. The­re were 23 per­sons on board, inclu­ding 16 pas­sen­gers. The Sys­sel­man­nen deci­ded to evacua­te the pas­sen­gers by helico­per. The crew could remain on board to take care of the ves­sel as the­re was no imme­dia­te dan­ger. It is expec­ted that the crew can navi­ga­te the ship out of the ice with the shif­ting tides, some­thing that usual­ly invol­ves ope­nings in the ice. The Nor­we­gi­an coast guard is in the area to assist as nee­ded.

drift ice in the arc­tic sum­mer of 2019 – Pho­to on the sub­ject of Mal­mö in the ice