This area was first settled as a coal mining town in 1917 but later in the 1960’s it began being used as a research station for studying glaciers, climate and earth’s rotation, and positioning. It’s part of a global network for observation and research to map movements in the earths surface, rotation and orientation in space. Data is used for accurate GPS info and satellite orbits. Because of all these sensitive instruments the ship and all the passengers were required to turn off their WiFi, phones, computers, and gps.
Several of the buildings were from the 1960’s, a few even older. They have a museum and gift shop for visitors. For the residents, up to 180 researchers with 20 glaciology and climate institutes in the summer. They offer a sauna, movies, game rooms, and community dining hall.
This is also where Ronald Amundsen was based and tried to fly two airplanes to the North Pole in 1928. The planes were brought here in pieces. Amundsen put them together and when weather conditions were right they flew two planes towards the pole on May 23. They didn’t make it. One plane had engine trouble so they both landed on an ice floe. 24 days later the plane was repaired and the men had cleared a runway on the ice. They all returned to Ny-Alesund
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