Portal:Svalbard
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Introduction
Svalbard (/ˈsvɑːlbɑːr/; Norwegian pronunciation: [ˈsʋɑ(ː)lbɑːɾ]; prior to 1925 known by its Dutch name Spitsbergen) is a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean. Situated north of mainland Europe, it is about midway between continental Norway and the North Pole. The islands of the group range from 74° to 81° north latitude, and from 10° to 35° east longitude. The largest island is Spitsbergen, followed by Nordaustlandet and Edgeøya. Administratively, the archipelago is not part of any Norwegian county, but forms an unincorporated area administered by a governor appointed by the Norwegian government. Since 2002, Svalbard's main settlement, Longyearbyen, has had an elected local government, somewhat similar to mainland municipalities. Other settlements include the Russian mining community of Barentsburg, the research station of Ny-Ålesund, and the mining outpost of Sveagruva. Ny-Ålesund is the northernmost settlement in the world with a permanent civilian population. Other settlements are farther north, but are populated only by rotating groups of researchers.
The islands were first taken into use as a whaling base in the 17th and 18th centuries, after which they were abandoned. Coal mining started at the beginning of the 20th century, and several permanent communities were established. The Svalbard Treaty of 1920 recognizes Norwegian sovereignty, and the 1925 Svalbard Act made Svalbard a full part of the Kingdom of Norway. They also established Svalbard as a free economic zone and a demilitarized zone. The Norwegian Store Norske and the Russian Arktikugol remain the only mining companies in place. Research and tourism have become important supplementary industries, with the University Centre in Svalbard (UNIS) and the Svalbard Global Seed Vault playing critical roles. No roads connect the settlements; instead snowmobiles, aircraft and boats serve inter-community transport. Svalbard Airport, Longyear serves as the main gateway.
Selected general articles
The Svalbard Treaty (originally the Spitsbergen Treaty) recognises the sovereignty of Norway over the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard, at the time called Spitsbergen. The exercise of sovereignty is, however, subject to certain stipulations, and not all Norwegian law applies. The treaty regulates the demilitarisation of the archipelago. The signatories were given equal rights to engage in commercial activities (mainly coal mining) on the islands. As of 2012[update], Norway and Russia are making use of this right.
Uniquely, the archipelago is an entirely visa-free zone under the terms of the Svalbard Treaty. Read more...
The settlement of Smeerenburg on Amsterdam Island in northwest Svalbard was founded by Danish and Dutch whalers in 1619 as one of Europe's northernmost outposts. Read more...
Pyramiden Heliport (Norwegian: Pyramiden helikopterhavn; ICAO: ENPY) is a heliport located at Pyramiden in Svalbard, Norway. The airport is owned and operated by Arktikugol, who owns the mining town. The airport consists of a gravel runway and apron measuring 90 by 40 meters (300 by 130 ft) and a small terminal building. There is capacity for up to three helicopters on the apron. Flights are carried out by Spark+ using two Mil Mi-8 helicopters. Flights are flown to Barentsburg Heliport, Heerodden and Svalbard Airport, Longyear at irregular intervals.
The airport opened in 1961 to allow Aeroflot to commence flights between Barentsburg and Pyramiden using Mil Mi-4 airport. An upgrade was carried out in the late 1970s after the airport in Longyearbyen opened. By then five Mil Mi-8 were stationed on Svalbard. A crash during landing on 27 March 1991 killed two people. Flights were reduced during the 1990s and from 1998 Pyramiden was abandoned, reducing use of the heliport to a minimum. Read more...
Svalbard is an Arctic wilderness archipelago comprising the northernmost part of Norway. There are twenty-nine protected natural areas, consisting of seven national parks, six nature reserves, fifteen bird sanctuaries and one geotope protected area. In addition, human traces dating from before 1946 are automatically protected. The protected areas make up 39,800 square kilometers (15,400 sq mi) or 65% of the land area, and 78,000 square kilometers (30,000 sq mi) or 86.5% of the territorial waters. The largest protected areas are Nordaust-Svalbard Nature Reserve and Søraust-Svalbard Nature Reserve, which cover most of the areas east of the main island of Spitsbergen, including the islands of Nordaustlandet, Edgeøya, Barentsøya, Kong Karls Land and Kvitøya. Six of the national parks are located on Spitsbergen. Ten of the bird sanctuaries and the Moffen Nature Reserve are located within national parks. Five of the bird sanctuaries are Ramsar sites and fourteen of the bird sanctuaries are islands. Svalbard is on Norway's tentative list for nomination as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The supreme responsibility for conservation lies with the Norwegian Ministry of the Environment, which has delegated the management to the Governor of Svalbard and the Norwegian Directorate for Nature Management. The foundation for conservation was established in the Svalbard Treaty of 1920, and has been further specified in the Svalbard Environmental Act of 2001. The first round of protection took force on 1 July 1973, when most of the current protected areas came into effect. This included the two large nature reserves and three of the national parks. Moffen Nature Reserve was established in 1983, followed by four national parks, three nature reserves and one geotope protection area between 2002 and 2005. Read more...
Longyearbyen (Norwegian pronunciation: [ˈlɔŋjiːrbyːən] (literally The Longyear Town) is the largest settlement and the administrative centre of Svalbard, Norway. , the town had a population of 2,144. Longyearbyen is located in the Longyear Valley and on the shore of Adventfjorden, a bay of Isfjorden located on the west coast of Spitsbergen. Since 2002, Longyearbyen Community Council has had many of the same responsibilities of a municipality, including utilities, education, cultural facilities, fire brigade, roads and ports. The town is the seat of the Governor of Svalbard. It is the world's northernmost settlement of any kind with more than 1,000 permanent residents.
Known as Longyear City until 1926, the town was established by and named after John Munro Longyear, whose Arctic Coal Company started coal mining operations in 1906. Operations were taken over by Store Norske Spitsbergen Kulkompani (SNSK) in 1916, which still conducts mining. The town was almost completely destroyed by the German Kriegsmarine on 8 August 1943, but was rebuilt after the Second World War. Traditionally, Longyearbyen was a company town, but most mining operations have moved to Sveagruva since the 1990s, while the town has seen a large increase in tourism and research. This has seen the arrival of institutions such as the University Centre in Svalbard, the Svalbard Global Seed Vault and Svalbard Satellite Station. The community is served by Svalbard Airport and Svalbard Church. Read more...- Tourism in Svalbard
The economy of Svalbard is dominated by coal mining, tourism and research. In 2007, there were 484 people working in the mining sector, 211 people working in the tourism sector and 111 people working in the education sector. The same year, mining gave a revenue of 2.008 billion kr, tourism NOK 317 million and research 142 million. In 2006, the average income for economically active people was NOK 494,700, or 23% higher than on the mainland. Almost all housing is owned by the various employers and institutions and rented to their employees; there are only a few privately owned houses, most of which are recreational cabins. Because of this, it is nearly impossible to live on Svalbard without working for an established institution. The Spitsbergen Treaty and Svalbard Act established Svalbard as an economic free zone and demilitarized zone in 1925. Read more... - .sj is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) reserved for the designation Svalbard and Jan Mayen. The domain name registry is Norid, but .sj is not open for registration. The issuing of the domain was based on the ISO 3166 designation of Svalbard and Jan Mayen, which consists of two separately administrated integrated territories of Norway: the Arctic archipelago Svalbard and the nearly uninhabited volcanic island Jan Mayen. .sj was designated on 21 August 1997, at the same time as Bouvet Island was allocated .bv. Both were placed under the .no registry Norid, which is also the sponsor. Norwegian policy states that .no is sufficient for those institutions connected to both Svalbard and Jan Mayen, and therefore the domain is not open to registration. It is Norwegian policy not to commercialize domain resources, so there are no plans to sell .sj. Should the domain later come into use, it will be under regulation of the Norwegian Post and Telecommunications Authority and follow the same policy as .no. There are two second-level domains reserved for the two areas: svalbard.no and jan-mayen.no, but other web addresses are also used. Read more...
Isfjord Radio is a coast radio station and weather station located at Kapp Linné on the island Spitsbergen in Svalbard, Norway. The station was established in 1933, and has played an important role in the telecommunications between the Svalbard archipelago and the outside world. The station was destroyed during World War II, and rebuilt in 1946. The station was important for ships traffic and air traffic. Satellite communications were established in 1979, but depreciated when a fiber optic cable between Svalbard and the mainland was finished in 2004. Isfjord Radio was automated and depopulated in 1999. Parts of the outdated installations have been preserved as a historical site. Read more...
Longyearbyen Community Council (Norwegian: Longyearbyen lokalstyre) is the local government for Longyearbyen in Svalbard, Norway. It has many of the same responsibilities of a municipality. It is organized with a 15-member council which since 2011 has been led by Mayor Christin Kristoffersen of the Labour Party. The council's main responsibilities are infrastructure and utilities, including power, land-use and community planning, education from kindergarten to upper secondary level and child welfare. It operates three kindergartens in addition to the 13-grade Longyearbyen School.
The Svalbard Council was established on 1 November 1971. It consisted of 17 non-partisan members which were elected or appointed in three different groups—SNSK employees, government employees and others, although the ratio changed several times. Svalbard Samfunnsdrift (SSD), a limited company which was responsible for public infrastructure and services, was established by SNSK on 1 January 1989. Responsibilities included healthcare, the fire department, the kindergarten, roads, garbage disposal, power production, the water and sewer system, the cinema, cultural actives and the library. Ownership was taken over by the Ministry of Trade and Industry on 1 January 1993. During the 1990s, the authorities started a process to "normalize" Longyearbyen by abolishing the company town scheme and introducing a full range of services, a varied economy and local democracy. The Svalbard Council changed its regulations from 1993 and allowed parties to run for election. Longyearbyen Community Council was established in 2002, replacing the Svalbard Council and assimilating SSD. Read more...- The Norwegian Polar Institute (in Norwegian: Norsk Polarinstitutt) is Norway's central governmental institution for scientific research, mapping and environmental monitoring in the Arctic and the Antarctic. It is run under the auspices of the Norwegian Ministry of Climate and Environment. The institute conducts research in the polar regions, provides management relevant knowledge for the Norwegian authorities, and organizes expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctic regions. The institute runs year-round the Sverdrup research station in Ny-Ålesund on Svalbard and the Troll station in Antarctica. In addition the Norvegia station which is located on the Bouvet Island in the Southern Ocean and the Tor Field Station on Antarctica are used for shorter term work. Its offices are in Tromsø and Longyearbyen, Svalbard, in addition to the research stations in Queen Maud Land and Svalbard, and employs approximately 150 persons. It has the responsibility to enforce international treaties regarding Antarctic activities by Norwegian citizens or corporations.
The institute was founded as Norges Svalbard- og Ishavsundersøkelser by AdolfAdo Hoel in 1928. Read more... - The landing site at Hotellneset
The Svalbard Undersea Cable System is a twin submarine communications cable which connects Svalbard to the mainland of Norway. The two optical fiber cable consist of two segments, from Harstad to Breivika in Andøy, and from Breivika to Hotellneset near Longyearbyen in Svalbard. The segments from Harstad to Breivika are 74 and 61 kilometers (46 and 38 mi) long, respectively, and the segments from Breivika to Hotellneset 1,375 and 1,339 kilometers (854 and 832 mi). Each consists of eight fiber pairs and there are twenty optical communications repeaters on each segment. Each segment has a speed of 10 gigabits per second (Gb/s), with a future potential capacity of 2,500 Gbit/s. The system is now the sole telecommunications link to the archipelago.
Planning of the cables started in 2002 by the Norwegian Space Centre (NSC), who wanted increased bandwidth to expand their business at Svalbard Satellite Station (SvalSat). At the time all telecommunications from Svalbard were relayed via communications satellite. Financing was secured through a deal with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The cable system was supplied by Tyco Communications and laying of the cable was carried out by Global Marine Systems in July and August 2003. Read more...
Barentsburg Heliport, Heerodden (Norwegian: Barentsburg helikopterhavn, Heerodden; ICAO: ENBA) is a private heliport located at Heerodden (also known as Kapp Heer), serving the mining town of Barentsburg in Svalbard, Norway. The airport is owned and operated by Arktikugol, which also owns the company town. The airport features a 91-by-21-meter (299 by 69 ft) runway, two hangars and an administration building with a control tower. There are two Mil Mi-8 helicopters based at Heerodden, which are operated by Spark+. Flights are provided to Svalbard Airport, Longyear and Pyramiden Heliport.
The heliport was built by Arktikugol in 1961 and the company originally flew two Mil Mi-4 helicopters. The airport received a major upgrade between 1975 and 1978, following the opening of Svalbard Airport, Longyear. This saw the number of operative aircraft increase to five and the arrival of the Mi-8, operated by Aeroflot. Operations were cut in the early 1990s, with only two aircraft remaining by 1993. There was a fatal crash at the airport in 2008, killing three of nine passengers. Read more...
The Svalbard Global Seed Vault (Norwegian: Svalbard globale frøhvelv) is a secure seed bank on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen near Longyearbyen in the remote Arctic Svalbard archipelago, about 1,300 kilometres (810 mi) from the North Pole. Conservationist Cary Fowler, in association with the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), started the vault to preserve a wide variety of plant seeds that are duplicate samples, or "spare" copies, of seeds held in gene banks worldwide. The seed vault is an attempt to insure against the loss of seeds in other genebanks during large-scale regional or global crises. The seed vault is managed under terms spelled out in a tripartite agreement between the Norwegian government, the Crop Trust and the Nordic Genetic Resource Center (NordGen).
The Norwegian government entirely funded the vault's approximately 45 million kr (US$8.8 million in 2008) construction. Storing seeds in the vault is free to end users, with Norway and the Crop Trust paying for operational costs. Primary funding for the Trust comes from organisations such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and from various governments worldwide. Read more...
Nordaustlandet (sometimes translated as North East Land) is the second-largest island in the archipelago of Svalbard, Norway, with an area of 14,443 square kilometres (5,576 sq mi). It lies north east of Spitsbergen, separated by Hinlopen Strait. Much of Nordaustlandet lies under large ice caps, mainly Austfonna and Vestfonna, the remaining parts of the north being tundra inhabited by reindeer and walruses. The island is uninhabited and lies entirely within Nordaust-Svalbard Nature Reserve. Read more...
Nordvest-Spitsbergen National Park (Norwegian: Nordvest-Spitsbergen nasjonalpark) is located on the Norwegian arctic archipelago of Svalbard and includes parts of north-west Spitsbergen (Albert I Land and Haakon VII Land) and nearby islands such as Danes Island and Moffen. It contains, among other things, warm springs and remains of volcanoes in Bockfjorden. Read more...
Polish Polar Station, Hornsund (Polish: Polska Stacja Polarna, Hornsund) is at Isbjørnhamna in Hornsund, on Spitsbergen in the Norwegian Svalbard archipelago, operated since 1957. Read more...- The Svalbard Act of 17 July 1925 no. 11, normally referred to as the Svalbard Act (Norwegian: Lov om Svalbard or colloquially Svalbardloven), is a law of Norway which governs the major aspects of the Svalbard archipelago. The law was passed by the Parliament of Norway on 17 July 1925, establishes Norwegian sovereignty of the island, and states that Norwegian criminal law, civil law and procedure law are enforced on the island. Otherwise, other provisions and laws only apply when specified. The act further established the policy for administration, including creating the Governor of Svalbard, and since 2002, Longyearbyen Community Council. The act also establishes rules for real estate and environmental protection.
The act was passed as a response to the Spitsbergen Treaty of 9 February 1920, which established Norwegian sovereignty of Svalbard, but limited the archipelago to a free economic zone and demilitarized zone. The act established the basis for an orderly civil society on the islands, which had until that point been prone to lawlessness among miners, fishermen and hunters. Read more...
Barentsøya, sometimes anglicized as Barents Island, is an island in the Svalbard archipelago of Norway, lying between Edgeøya and Spitsbergen. Barents Island has no permanent human inhabitants. Named for the Dutch explorer Willem Barents (who actually never sighted the island), it is a part of Søraust-Svalbard Nature Reserve.
Barentsøya is an Arctic island. Around 43 per cent of its area of 1,288 square kilometres (497 sq mi) is glaciated. To the north, in the sound between Barentsøya and Spitsbergen, lies the island of Kükenthaløya. To the south, the sound separating Barents Island from Edgeøya is Freemansundet. Read more...- Arktikugol (Russian: Арктикуголь, literally "Arctic Coal"' full name Федеральное государственное унитарное предприятие (ФГУП) государственный трест (ГТ) «Арктикуголь» ) is a Russian coal mining unitary enterprise which operates on the islands of Spitsbergen in Svalbard, Norway. Owned by the Government of Russia, Arktikugol currently has limited mining in Barentsburg. Previously it has carried out mining operations and still owns the towns of Pyramiden and Grumant, with its port at Colesbukta. The company is headquartered in Moscow and is the official agency through which Russia, and previously the Soviet Union, exercised its Svalbard policy.
The company was established on 7 October 1931 to take over all Soviet mining interests on Svalbard. At the time Grumant and Pyramiden were bought, although only Grumant was in operation. It also bought Barentsburg from Dutch interests. The company retained operation there and in Grumant until 1941, when all employees were evacuated to the mainland as part of Operation Gauntlet. Mining resumed in 1947 and commenced in Pyramiden in 1955. Declining coal deposits resulted in Grumant being closed in 1961. Throughout the 1960s to 80s Arktikugol carried out a series of oil drilling on the archipelago, but never succeeded at finding profitable reservoirs. From the 1990s the company lost a lot of its subsidies and cut production, resulting in Pyramiden being closed in 1998. The company has attempted to diversify, without success. Read more...
Svalbard is an archipelago in the Arctic Ocean roughly centered on
78° north latitude and 20° east longitude. The archipelago is the northernmost part of the Kingdom of Norway. The three main islands in the group consist of Spitsbergen (the largest island), Nordaustlandet and Edgeøya. There are also a number of smaller islands, such as Barents Island (Barentsøya) (1,288 km2 (497 sq mi)), Kvitøya (682 km2 (263 sq mi)), Prins Karls Forland (English: Prince Charles Foreland) (615 km2 (237 sq mi)), Kongsøya (191 km2 (74 sq mi)), Bear Island (178 km2 (69 sq mi)), Svenskøya (137 km2 (53 sq mi)), Wilhelm Island (120 km2 (46 sq mi)) and other smaller islands or skerries (621 km2 (240 sq mi)). Read more...
Pyramiden (meaning "the pyramid" in most Scandinavian languages; called Пирамида, Piramida, in Russian) is a Russian settlement and coal-mining community on the archipelago of Svalbard, Norway. Founded by Sweden in 1910 and sold to the Soviet Union in 1927, Pyramiden was closed in 1998 and has since remained largely abandoned with most of its infrastructure and buildings still in place. Since 2007 there have been efforts to make it a tourist attraction. Read more...
Map of Svalbard with Spitsbergen in the west emphasised
Spitsbergen (formerly known as West Spitsbergen; Norwegian: Vest Spitsbergen or Vestspitsbergen, also sometimes spelled Spitzbergen) is the largest and only permanently populated island of the Svalbard archipelago in northern Norway. Constituting the westernmost bulk of the archipelago, it borders the Arctic Ocean, the Norwegian Sea, and the Greenland Sea. Spitsbergen covers an area of 37,673 km2 (14,546 sq mi), making it the largest island in Norway and the 36th-largest in the world. The administrative centre is Longyearbyen. Other settlements, in addition to research outposts, are the Russian mining community of Barentsburg, the research community of Ny-Ålesund, and the mining outpost of Sveagruva. Spitsbergen was covered in 21,977 km2 (8,485 sq mi) of ice in 1999, which was approximately 58.5% of the island's total area.
The island was first used as a whaling base in the 17th and 18th centuries, after which it was abandoned. Coal mining started at the end of the 19th century, and several permanent communities were established. The Svalbard Treaty of 1920 recognized Norwegian sovereignty and established Svalbard as a free economic zone and a demilitarized zone. Read more...- Novelists, screenwriters and filmmakers have set their works in Svalbard, an archipelago in the Arctic which constitutes the northernmost part of Norway. Fictional works about Svalbard often make reference to its Arctic climate, the isolation of the archipelago and the natural beauty of its vast glaciers, mountains and fjords. Read more...
Gustav V Land is located on the northwestern part of Nordaustlandet, Svalbard.
Gustav V Land is a land area comprising the peninsula on the northwestern part of Nordaustlandet, Svalbard in Arctic Norway. It constitutes roughly one quarter of the island's area, approximately 4000 km2, being some 80 km wide east–west and 85 km north–south, connected to the rest of the island by a 22-km-wide isthmus in the southeast. The peninsula is bordered to the south by Wahlenbergfjorden, to the west by Hinlopen Strait and Hinlopenrenna, to the north by Nordkappsundet, and to the east by Nordenskiöldbukta and Rijpfjorden. Gustav Adolf Land is to the south and Prins Oscars Land is to the east. The boundary of Gustav V Land passes through Rijpdalen and Flaumdalen to Winsnesbreen in the east, continues further southwest to Brånevatnet, and thence follows the river from Brånevatnet to the sea at Bodleybukta. The highest elevation is 630 metres (2,070 ft) on the glacier Vestfonna, which covers large parts of the land.
The coast is heavily indented, especially in the west and north. Principal fjords are Murchisonfjorden to the west; Lady Franklinfjorden and Brennevinsfjorden to the northwest; Lindhagenbukta, Sabinebukta, Carolusbukta and Planciusbukta to the north; and Bengtsenbukta to the northeast. Main peninsulas are Gotiahalvøya and Storsteinhalvøya in the west, Botniahalvøya in the northwest, and Lapponiahalvøya with Kapp Rubin in the north. The largest islands are Søre Russøya in Murchisonfjorden, Lågøya in Lady Franklinfjorden, Chermsideøya and Castrénøyane north of Lapponiahalvøya, and Scoresbyøya in Nordenskiöldbukta. Read more...- The Svalbard Rocket Range (Norwegian: Svalbard Rakettskytefelt) or SvalRak is a launch site for sounding rockets at Ny-Ålesund in Svalbard, Norway. The site has been in use since 1997 and is owned by Andøya Rocket Range, which is owned by the Norwegian Space Centre and the Kongsberg Group. SvalRak's location at the 79th parallel north makes it well-suited for launching rockets to investigate Earth's magnetic field. It is used mostly by American, Japanese and Norwegian researchers. It is the world's northernmost launch site. Read more...
- Svalbard has a population of approximately 2,395 people as of 2011. Approximately 70% of the people are Norwegian; the remaining 30% are Russian and Ukrainian. The official language of Svalbard is Norwegian. Russian is used in the Russian settlements, but formerly, Russenorsk was the lingua franca of the entire Barents Sea region.
The annual population growth is -0.02%, but as may be seen from the following chart, the ex-Soviet population has atrophied, while the Norwegians have been increasing. Read more... - Sveagruva (meaning Swedish Mine), or simply Svea, is a mining settlement in the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard, lying at the head of Van Mijenfjord.
It is the third largest settlement in the archipelago (after Longyearbyen and Barentsburg). Currently, around 300 workers living in Longyearbyen commute to Sveagruva for work on a daily or weekly basis. Sveagruva has no permanent inhabitants. The mine is operated by Store Norske Spitsbergen Kulkompani and is served by Svea Airport. Read more...
The station was located at the far end of Ny-Ålesund Airport, Hamnerabben (left). One of the radomes is visible.
Kongsfjord Telemetry Station (Norwegian: Kongsfjord telemetristasjon) was a satellite ground station located nearby Ny-Ålesund in Svalbard, Norway. It was used between 1967 and 1974 as one of the four initial ground stations which were part of the European Space Tracking Network (ESTRACK) serving the European Space Research Organization's (ESRO) first generation of satellites. The station provided radio tracking, telemetry and commanding services as well as data download. Although owned by ESRO, the facilities were constructed and operated by the Royal Norwegian Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (NTNF).
Plans for the station's construction started in the early 1960s and negotiations between ESRO and Norwegian authorities started in 1964, despite Norway's lack of membership in ESRO. An initial disagreement of whether to locate the facility by Ny-Ålesund or Longyearbyen was overcome, and an agreement was signed on 14 December 1964. However, it was followed up by numerous protests from the Soviet Union, which claimed the installation would violate the demilitarized zone clause of the Svalbard Treaty, as the station had the potential to be used for military satellites and intelligence. The protests were rejected by Norwegian authorities, and construction started in May 1965. The Soviet Union attempted several inspections; one resulted in the crash of a Soviet helicopter. Operations commenced in 1967, but the facility was closed in 1974 as the facility was not suitable for new satellites with higher orbits. Read more...
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Selected images
Snowmobiles are an important mode of transport in Svalbard, such as here at Longyearbyen.
Prins Karls Forland was protected as Forlandet National Park in 1973
In the Age of Discovery (Age of Exploration), the Dutch were the first (non-natives) to explore and map many unknown isolated areas of the world, including the Svalbard archipelago and Jan Mayen in the Arctic Ocean.
NASA research facility in Ny-Ålesund
The dock house in Barentsburg
Tourists viewing a glacier
Spitsbergen during August
Female polar bear with cub
Barentsburg School
Western coast of Bünsow Land. Located at Isfjorden in Spitsbergen.
Spitsbergen and Svalbard during the (c. 1590s–1720s). Portion of 1599 map of Arctic exploration by Willem Barentsz. Spitsbergen, here mapped for the first time, is indicated as "Het Nieuwe Land" (Dutch for "the New Land"), center-left. This is a typical map from the Golden Age of Dutch cartography.
Abandoned aerial tramway previously used for transporting coal
Tundra at Bellsund
MS Nordsyssel, the Governor's vessel, docked at Ny-Ålesund
Total solar eclipse of 20 March 2015 from Longyearbyen, Norway
The whaling station of the Amsterdam chamber of the Northern Company in Smeerenburg, by Cornelis de Man (1639), but based on a painting of a Dansk hvalfangststation (Danish whaling station) by A.B.R. Speeck (1634), which represented the Danish station in Copenhagen Bay (Kobbefjorden).
Company homes in Longyearbyen
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