Danskøya

Gene­ral: Dan­s­køya (“Danish Island”) is a rather small island and the nor­thwes­tern cor­ner of Spits­ber­gen. It is famous for the north pole expe­di­ti­ons laun­ched by the Swe­de Salo­mon August Andrée and the Ame­ri­can Wal­ter Well­man from Vir­go­ham­na on Dan­s­køya.

Spe­cial per­mis­si­on is requi­red to land at Vir­go­ham­na, and strict regu­la­ti­ons are to be fol­lo­wed to pro­tect the his­to­ri­cal heri­ta­ge.

Andrée’s baloon Örnen in Vir­go­ham­na, Dan­s­køya, rea­dy for take off on 11th July 1897.

Geo­lo­gy: All meta­mor­phic base­ment rocks (gneiss, phyl­li­te, mica schist), uplifted during north atlan­tic rif­ting in the upper Creta­ce­ous and lower Ter­tia­ry.

Hiking over stones and bould­ers on Dan­s­køya.

Land­scape: Most of Dan­s­køya is made up of rocky hills up to 300 met­res high (maxi­mum 351 m). The sur­face ist most­ly cover­ed with big stones and bould­ers (click here for a pan­ora­ma pho­to of that kind of land­scape on the east side of Dan­s­køya). The eas­tern part of the island, towards Smee­ren­burg­fjord, is more flat. On the wes­tern side, the bay Kob­befjord (“seal bay”) is cut­ting into the island. It is gene­ral­ly pos­si­ble to make dif­fe­rent nice hikes on Dan­s­køya, but the rocky sur­face makes hiking quite deman­ding and incon­ve­ni­ent unless you are used to that kind of ter­rain. The­re are no gla­ciers, but some per­ma­nent snow­fields and some small lakes.

Litt­le lake on Dan­s­køya, east of Kob­befjord.

Flo­ra and fau­na: Vege­ta­ti­on is very scarse, most­ly limi­t­ed to moss beds. Har­bour seals, a rare and unu­su­al seal spe­ci­es in the high arc­tic, are often seen on stones near the shore, espe­ci­al­ly during low tide. Pur­ple sand­pi­pers are abun­dant, loo­king for food in the tidal zone. Arc­tic fox and polar bear are roa­ming across Dan­s­køya more or less regu­lar­ly.

Har­bour seals in Vir­go­ham­na, Dan­s­køya.

Histo­ry: The histo­ry is the main attrac­tion on Dan­s­køya, attrac­ting visi­tors in signi­fi­cant num­bers, almost exclu­si­ve­ly to a very limi­t­ed area in Vir­go­ham­na. This is the site whe­re Salo­mon August Andrée from Swe­den tried to launch his bal­loon Örnen (The Eagle) in 1896 and 1897. He and his 2 fel­low com­ra­des dis­ap­peared and were found dead only in 1930 on Kvi­tøya. In 1906, 1907 and 1909, he was fol­lo­wed in the same place by the Ame­ri­can jour­na­list Wal­ter Well­man, who tried to reach the north pole with his air­ship Ame­ri­ca, but fai­led on all attempts. Both left a lot of arti­facts in Vir­go­ham­na, a lot of which can still be seen. See the race to the pole 2: Vir­go­ham­na in the histo­ry sec­tion of this web­site.

Monu­ment for the Swe­dish bal­loon pio­neer Andrée in Vir­go­ham­na, Dan­s­køya.

Remains from Wellman’s air ship expe­di­ti­ons in Vir­go­ham­na, Dan­s­køya.

17th cen­tu­ry wha­lers had their sta­ti­ons both in Vir­go­ham­na and in Kob­befjord on the west side of Dan­s­køya. Tho­se in Vir­go­ham­na, whe­re both gra­ves and blub­ber oven foun­da­ti­ons can still be seen, whe­re from Har­lin­gen in the Net­her­lands. The wha­lers in Kob­befjord came from Den­mark. The­re are no visi­ble traces from that time in Kob­befjord.

Kob­befjord on the west side of Dan­s­køya. Danish wha­lers had a sta­ti­on here in the 17th cen­tu­ry. In spring 1922, Kob­befjord was the stage of a tra­ge­dy when Harald Simon­sen and Tor­ge­ir Møkle­by died here.

In 1922, a tra­ge­dy took place in Kob­befjord, when the Nor­we­gi­ans Harald Simon­sen and Tor­ge­ir Møkle­by stran­ded the­re and star­ved to death. They had left a wea­ther sta­ti­on at Kva­de­hu­ken in Kongsfjord with a boat to look for a trap­per who was miss­ing, but beca­me trap­ped in ice and drifted nor­thwards. They were found dead in 1923, their dia­ries could be reco­ver­ed.

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