Storfjord – Negri­b­reen & Straums­land – 14 Sep­tem­ber 2023

Thu
14 Sep
2023

Negri­b­reen is among­st the lar­gest gla­ciers of the main island of Spits­ber­gen. Ear­lier I would have said the lar­gest gla­cier of the main island, but I am not so sure any­mo­re.

End­less amounts of ice in all shapes and colours, some ice­bergs with other­world­ly beau­tiful blue colours. A gla­cier front kilo­me­t­res long. A mons­trous cal­ving … extre­me­ly impres­si­ve, extre­me­ly beau­tiful.

The chan­ges that are appa­rent here are less beau­tiful. The eas­tern part, which used to be a stun­ning and very much ali­ve gla­cier front just a cou­ple of years ago, has part­ly dis­ap­peared, and the part that is still the­re is now redu­ced to a huge tabu­lar pie­ce of ice that is dead now, wit­hout a con­nec­tion to the acti­ve part of the gla­cier. It will just dis­ap­pear within a few years. In other words, the eas­tern part of Negri­b­reen has seen an almost com­ple­te col­lap­se, and the once so huge gla­cier is, well, still huge, but in com­pa­ri­son to its past, a mere shadow of its pre­vious size.

Gal­lery – Storfjord: Negri­b­reen & Straums­land – 14 Sep­tem­ber 2023

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Later, we went to Heley­sund and Straums­land. A beau­tiful part of Spits­ber­gen, with tun­dra, lakes, wet­lands, basalt land­scapes, Spits­ber­gen reinde­er, arc­tic foxes and beau­tiful views of Heley­sund, Küken­thaløya and Barent­søya.

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