Reorientating logistics to the archipelago of Franz Josef Land
(Correne Coetzer) Irina Orlova and the Barneo Ice Camp Organizers have issued the following statement today:
Well then, our dear friends, the 15th Season of Barneo camp is close to the end. A milestone season, and a crucial one. Not yet time to strike the balance, as the people are still on the ice, though we are partially packing up the camp. But it became clear that we should change the route and quit Svalbard.
Everyone of you, who watched Barneo news, knows how hard it was to start the season. Then on April, 7 we got further problems from the Norwegian authorities. Trude Petterson, The Independent Barents Observer reporter, found a threat to national security in our conventional activities. On these grounds the Norwegian authorities made the transportation rules much more rigorous: apart from normal permission request 48 hours before the flight (what we’ve been always performing punctually), they now require detailed list of passengers and cargo to be submitted 48 hours before. But in Arctic it’s hard to predict how things will unfold on the ice. Therefore it’s just impossible to follow new rules.
In recent years, the Norwegian authorities treated our work loyally and set our North Pole flights equal to sanitary ones. The Longyearbyen terminal security service has been checking the passengers and freight just before each departure. But today a formal request is required 48 hrs before a take-off.
We reorient our logistics to the archipelago of Franz Josef Land, in restoration of which we have recently been involved (a photo album we’ll publish a bit later). END
[Editor’s Note: here is an article written by Trude Pettersen in The Independent Barends Observer:
Chechen special forces instructors landed on Svalbard
Previous on Pythom:
Barneo: False Social Media Rumors about Chechen soldiers]
Barneo is a drifting ice base in the Arctic, which is annually established under the aegis of the Russian Geographical Society expedition center “Polyus” Russian Association of Polar Explorers.
It is a temporary Ice Camp, built by the Russians every North Pole ski season. The camp is built on a suitable ice floe inside 89 degrees North. Primarily the ice floe should be suitable to build a runway of at least 1200m long for an Antonov-74 to land from Longyearbyen, Svalbard. They, therefore, need a floe of at least 2km long and at east 40 meters away from the nearest open water (lead).
This year, when the ice floe was found on March 25, an Ilyushin-76 flew from Russia, dropped two tractors by parachute, as well as staff and other equipment to start clearing the runway. The tent camp that is built every year, serves as a base camp for skiers, tourists, runners and scientists.
The town of Longyearbyen is situated on the biggest Island of the Svalbard archipelago, Spitsbergen, inside the Arctic Circle, and under Norwegian rule. Svalbard had a total of 2,654 residents on January 1, 2016.
The Geographic North Pole is at 90 degrees North.
A degree of latitude is 110 km / 70 miles / 60 nautical miles.
Follow updates in the Daily Dispatch Streams of skiers, Barneo and more on Explorersweb and pythom.com (teams with RSS blog feeds).
Check Polar Jargon as explained on ThePoles.com
Barneo Ice Camp:
https://rgocenter.ru/blog/ RGO = Russian Geographical Society
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The Arctic (Russian) with the Support of the Russian Geographical Society
The Arctic (English) with the Support of the Russian Geographical Society
Previous/Related on Explorersweb/Pythom.com
North Pole update: the Antonov flies
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