DANGEROUS DRIVE: Governor issues warning about large meltwater opening on glacier in east Svalbard
By Mark Sabbatini on February 15, 2019
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With the winter/spring tour season about to hit full speed, The Governor of Svalbard is warning travelers to exercise extreme caution on Ulvebreen is east Svalbard due to a large meltwater channel across the glacier that may not be easily seen due to snow cover or other reasons.
An east Svalbard glacier where a large meltwater channel was observed is highlighted in red. Map by The Governor of Svalbard.
The gap was spotted during a recent flight over the glacier that ends at Dunerbukta. Pictures taken from the helicopter show a large meltwater channel across the glacier. The governor’s office stated the crack may have existed for many years, but not been as large or noticeable.
“There will be melt water channels occasionally – and perhaps more often now than before – but we have not seen a crack as bad as now,” said Police Chief Lt. Arnt Rennan, who took the photos of the opening, in an interview with Svalbardposten.
He emphasized people are responsible for their own safety when traveling and should not assume areas are safe if an alert about them has not been issued.
I'm a professional transient living on a tiny Norwegian island next door to the North Pole, where once a week (or thereabouts) I pollute our extreme and pristine environment with paper fishwrappers decorated with seemingly random letters that would cause a thousand monkeys with a thousand typewriters to die of humiliation.
Such is the wisdom one acquires after more than 25 years in the world's second-least-respected occupation, much of it roaming the seven continents in search of jazz, unrecognizable street food and escorts I f****d with by insisting they give me the platonic tours of their cities promised in their ads.
But it turns out this tiny group of islands known as Svalbard is my True Love and, generous contributions from you willing, I'll keep littering until they dig my body out when my climate-change-deformed apartment collapses or they exile my penniless ass because I'm not even worthy of washing your dirty dishes.
I'm a professional transient living on a tiny Norwegian island next door to the North Pole, where once a week (or thereabouts) I pollute our extreme and pristine environment with paper fishwrappers decorated with seemingly random letters that would cause a thousand monkeys with a thousand typewriters to die of humiliation.
Such is the wisdom one acquires after more than 25 years in the world's second-least-respected occupation, much of it roaming the seven continents in search of jazz, unrecognizable street food and escorts I f****d with by insisting they give me the platonic tours of their cities promised in their ads.
But it turns out this tiny group of islands known as Svalbard is my True Love and, generous contributions from you willing, I'll keep littering until they dig my body out when my climate-change-deformed apartment collapses or they exile my penniless ass because I'm not even worthy of washing your dirty dishes.
Icepeople is again facing an immediate existential crisis due (of course) to hardships largely inflected by the pandemic. In short, 1) the website needs $22 U.S. (190 NOK) to stay online for another month and 2) the editor needs any and all help possible to avoid homelessness in the middle of polar winter (not that it’s legal here any other time of the year).
So if you appreciate Icepeople for its unique stories about Svalbard and/or critical news during these critical times, as well as its features about the more colorful aspects of life here (today’s feature about the upcoming Polarjazz festival is for the event that first drew our editor’s attention to Svalbard way back in 2008) please do whatever you can during what are admittedly incredibly harsh times for many.
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