Welcome to my new blog - port of longyear

Since I start in my new job as port agent in a few days, I thought it might be cool to set up a little topical blog for this.

So here it is: Port of Longyear.

Check it out, I will try to post some nicer pics than the PortCam can provide them, and also some news and info on the boats we are currently handling.

National Geographic Explorer (ex. Lyngen) takes shape

As mentioned in an earlier post, Lindblad Expeditions, the pioneer in polar expedition cruising, is currently finishing a major conversion of the former "Hurtigruten" vessel Lyngen.



You can follow the progress of their work on their website, just follow this link.

They are already planning their season, spanning from the Baltic, Norway, Svalbard, Greenland and Iceland all the way down to Patagonia. You can see their itineraries here.

This should be the most up-to-date expedition cruise vessel on the market!

Maybe I should apply for a job there some time...

R & R in Buenos Aires

After having finished this season´s contract with Peregrine Shipping, I am taking a few days in Buenos Aires to recharge before I return to Ushuaia and to the Antarctic Peninsula for the final month of cruising. Yes, another full month! Believe it or not, my last trip is leaving on March 21 and due back in port April 1.

The next two trips will be with scuba diving customers, one on "Grigoriy Mikheev" and the next on its sister ship "Aleksey Maryshev", then the final trip will be on "Professor Multanovskiy" which is currently still operating for Quark Expeditions.

The last trip on Peregrine´s vessel "Akademik Ioffe" went to the Falklands, South Georgia and the northern Peninsula region. It was my first trip on the Ioffe and it took me a few days to get used to its slightly different setup. But the trip itself went great and the rest of the staff team were really great to work with again.

On the previous Falklands-South Georgia-AntPen (with Akad. Sergey Vavilov) trip we had made a landing on the South Orkneys, on this one we managed to zodiac cruise around Point Wild - what else can one wish for! As per usual, we got blown out of a few sites in South Georgia, but we always managed to make up for that by visiting some other places. And the Falklands impressed me yet again: incredible wildlife experiences, fantastic people, great atmosphere...

We were also briefed by several of the Quark management staff on the ongoing and future changes to the company and to our operations, now that Quark has assumed control of the former "Adventurefleet" ships, including Vavilov and Ioffe. The Quark Fleet will certainly be the biggest player on the market from now on, both in terms of ships and in terms of passenger capacity, with Hurtigruten as no.2 on the Antarctic market and Oceanwide as no. 2 on the Arctic (counting the current Arctic charter of "Antarctic Dream" as a part of the Oceanwide fleet).

On all occasions have Quark management confirmed that they will not resume scuba diving operations as part of their programme, so Oceanwide (and Waterproof Exp.) will remain the only players on that field.

Additionally, Quark is expanding its commitment in the Svalbard-East Greenland area by one ship. The Akademik Shokalsky will be joining the Akademik Sergey Vavilov in that area, so one can expect more encounters and more need for careful scheduling in the Svalbard area as well.

Interesting times!

Statements following the "Explorer" sinking

Fellow blogger and cruise ship specialist Doug Newman has been following the "Explorer" shipping disaster closely, and has also gathered statements from both GAP Adventures, the operating company of the ship at the time of the sinking, as well as from Lindblad Expeditions, the original operator of the ship, which put her into service in 1969.

Doug puts the prominent place of the "Explorer" into perspective like this:

"The “little red ship” was one of the most important cruise ships in history; the seminal expedition cruise ship, she was to expedition cruising what Royal Caribbean’s Song of Norway was to the rest of the cruising world, or maybe even more."

Sven-Olof Lindblad, the son of company founder Lars-Erik Lindblad, has posted an article titled Remembering the 'Little Red Ship' which recounts some of the dramatic history of the ship while it was still in operation for Lindblad Expeditions. You can download the full article here.

GAP Adventures’ CEO Bruce Poon Tip also issued a statement regarding the loss of the ship, finishing with the words:

"The Explorer left us in very dramatic fashion. She couldn't just go quietly in the night but instead, was hanging on and danced her way out of commission. She made everyone watch for just a minute to remember her history as she hung on long enough to allow all of her passengers to disembark to safety. I would expect nothing less from her. The Explorer has been a big part of our history as a company and represented the true spirit of what makes our company special. We thank everyone who has been part of making it happen over the years."

Compulsory Pilots for Svalbard Cruise Operators?

As the local newspaper Svalbardposten reports, "Kystverket"/The Norwegian Coastal Administration has proposed to introduce compulsory pilot services for cruise ships operating in Svalbard waters, effective from next summer. This article is unfortunately only available in Norwegian.

Click here to access the Kystverket post about it or click here to download the full report. For the moment, these two items are also available in Nowegian only.

International Polar Tourism Research Network now online

As polar tourism increases, so does the body of research that studies it. This newly launched website offers a comprehensive overview of literature on the subject of polar tourism (though mostly from a geographic viewpoint, as it seems) and is according to the website's own statement meant to "...foster increased connections between the many researchers studying polar tourism. In addition, the International Polar Tourism Research Network welcomes not only researchers, but also polar tourism operators, consultants, students and community leaders shaping the industry and phenomenon of polar tourism."



The creation of the International Polar Tourism Research Network is the idea of a group of polar tourism researchers who met in 2006 at the Annual conference of the Canadian Association of Geographer held that year at Lakehead University, in Thunder Bay.



The International Polar Tourism Research Network website is supported by the Université du Québec A Montréal (UQAM) and the Centre international de formation et de recherche en tourisme (CIFORT).

Unfortunately, that makes it a bit cumbersome to search, as this function is currently only available in French.

Stricter regulations on Svalbard cruise traffic

Quote from the Governor of Svalbard's website:

"The Governor of Svalbard hereby notifies that changes are being proposed to ”The Regulations concerning the establishment of bird reserves and large nature conservation areas in Svalbard” of 1st July 1973, last amended on 1st June 2007. The process will follow the standard case procedure regulations as determined in the Svalbard Environmental Protection Act §13.

In short, the topics for the revisions mentioned above are:

1) For North-west Spitsbergen, Forlandet and South Spitsbergen national parks, it has been proposed to amend the conservation regulations such that fuel quality carried and brought on board ships and other vessels sailing within the boundaries of the above named national parks will be subject to regulation. We refer to the introduction of the regulations from 1st June 2007 for vessels sailing within North-east Svalbard and South-east Svalbard nature reserves.

2) Introduction of travel restrictions at three automatically protected cultural heritage sites in North-west Spitsbergen and one automatically protected cultural heritage site in South-Spitsbergen national park is being considered.

3) For North-east Svalbard and South-east Svalbard nature reserves, amendments may be proposed to the conservation regulations so that going ashore from cruise ships/cruise vessels will be allowed on specific locations or in specific areas only
(fixed disembarkation areas/locations).








4) It is being considered to introduce travel restrictions at Midterhuken, Bellsund, an automatically protected cultural heritage site. Such regulations will be made pursuant to the Svalbard Environmental Protection Act §42 and Public Administration Act §37.

The deadline for receipt of comments and observations relative to the above proposals is decemver 20th 2007.

On the basis of comments received and the subsequent process, the Governor will draft formal discussion documents. The discussion documents will be presented at a hearing in the spring of 2008.

Svalbard Feltlogg - Field log

Beginning this November, the Svalbard Feltlogg (Field Log) will publish new warnings, messages etc. in both Norwegian and English. This log is a service supported by the Governor of Svalbard and Svalbard Reiseliv a/s (Svalbard Tourism), with contributions from local tour operators and the University Center in Svalbard, UNIS.

You can log in, subscribe and receive notification emails.

First allocation of fundings from Svalbard's environmental protection fund

(republished after Svalbard Science Forum homepage - news)

At 1 October 2007, the deadline for the first announcement of Svalbard's environmental protection fund, 26 different applicants had submitted 42 proposals for diverse projects and initiatives related to environmental protection in Svalbard. The total sum applied for was 11.2 Mio NOK and 46.4 % of the applications were research related.

The board of the fund has now allocated in total 1.7 Mio NOK to 15 projects and initiatives. Of these 15 projects 38% were research projects with a total sum of 640.000 NOK.

The Svalbard's environmental protection fund is pursuant to the Svalbard Environmental Protection Act. The fund's resources are used for projects and initiatives with the purpose of protecting the environment. The fund is financed by dues and funding allocation is dependant upon the income. The sources of income are the environment fee, fees fro hunting and fishing cards, the value of the flora and fauna which is handled in violation of the Svalbard environmental law and environmental compensations and enforced penalties set by The Governor of Svalbard.

The fund announces twice a year a call of proposals.

Click here to download the full list of accepted and denied proposals, with the respective sums applied for and granted. You can also find the file on my download pages.

Proceedings of the 2007 International Polar Diving Workshop available

The Smithsonian Institute's Scientific Diving Program has recently held an international workshop on Polar Diving in Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard. The proceedings are now available here and I have also uploaded them on my own website's download section.

Here is an overview of the contents of this proceedings issue:




Interestingly, the workshop also covered the "USCGC Healy Diving Mishap" where two US coast guard divers died during an under-ice dive. According to the report, there were several serious and hair-raising issues with the divers' qualifications, the site and dive supervision, inadequate training of dive tenders (who apparently were also consuming alcohol), extraordinary amounts of lead weights used by divers ("... in excess of 60 pounds...") and the list just goes on.
As I had blogged a while after the incident, this had also some serious consequences for the commanding officer of the USCGC Healy (see original posting here).

But the proceedings also specify the national requirements for ice diving for the various polar research programs:





Although it is a pretty thick volume to read through, it definitely contains lots of valuable information on polar diving, and not only for scientific diving applications but also for the recreational diver or even underwater photographers.

Arctic expedition cruise season finished

After 2.5 months of cruising the waters of Svalbard, Greenland and Iceland, I am finally back onshore - although still not home but on Svalbard ;-)

My "new" ship, the Vavilov, and the operator Peregrine proved to be a great success and a very enjoyable experience indeed. Many thanks to all who have sailed with me in this July and August!



I will shortly make the trip logs of the Vavilov reports available on my own download pages but some of them are currently also available on the operator's web pages at adventurefleet.com/files.

I am looking forward to a more relaxed autumn with some more teaching at the university center on Svalbard and some desk time at my new home office. And by the way, I am also getting married... ;-)

First Arctic Diving Trip 2007 - some pics and comments

You can find a recently updated selection of Arctic Summer pictures here. The trip started with a minor logistical hickup - the diving bottles and the compressor had not been transferred from the other vessel as planned, and the new equipment that had been bought and shipped as replacements did never arrive in Longyearbyen -but thanks to several helpful contacts in Longyearbyen and Ny-Ålesund, we managed to get everything necessary together within a hectic few hours. Thanks again to the Longyearbyen Dykkerklubb, University Center (logistics department), Norwegian Polar Institute, and Kings Bay a/s.

We had a great trip with 14 divers from the Netherlands, Ireland, and Great Britain, and we managed to get two really good iceberg dives as well as one dive north of 80° N (off Lågøya).

Brilliant weather and plentiful wildlife, experienced divers and a good team of expedition guides (thanks to Martin, Monika, Mick, and Mike) made sure that this trip turned out just great!

In a few hours, Monika, Mick and myself will be off for another seven days of cruising (this time without diving) and I am already looking forward to that. The next posting and fresh pictures will come on the 27.06.

Pre-season dresscode remarks

It is three days until the Arctic season 2007 starts for me, and I just realized that most people probably have a totally wrong perception of "working at sea": images of sailors with scraggly beards, unwashed feet and rough language spring to mind, while the same "sailors" are expected to be well-kempt, well-dressed and - in short - tamed by their spouses and families.

It turns out it is all the other way around... ;-)



In fact, right now both my landlord (oil platform medic) and his son-in-law (geophysical survey technician) prepare to go out at sea at the same day as me, and we all will have to shave, get a haircut, collect the newly ironed shirts with company logos and start thinking "company-speak" those days before we fly out. Out at work, we will be well-dressed, well-kempt and as polite as possible (well, the oil rig "company speak" might be a bit rougher at times) until we come home again.

Then we will go back to running around in the Harley-Davidson t-shirts, ski bum outfit, and faded jeans (banned on my workplace, can you believe it!) and grow our beards again (as much as our spouses will tolerate...).

Watch out for weekly to bi-weekly updates on the blog on the way things will go in the Arctic: diving, kayaking, new people and new vessels should make for yet another interesting season!

Svalbard Pages Forum: Walrus webcam discussion

If you are interested to discuss the recently reported plans for "walrus webcams" or any other subjects related to that Arctic archipelago halfway to the North Pole, why not join the Svalbard Pages Forum ?

Watch out for the Walrus Webcam!

Norwegian and international researchers of the Norwegian Polar Institute have been studying walrus and other seals at their haul-out sites for many years, typically using ice-going research vessels, zodiacs, and aircraft as their means of transport and observation platforms.

Now that they have been re-visiting the most populated walrus haul-out sites for years, they decided to deploy more advanced and at the same time more efficient recording methods in their seasonal studies: webcams.



In recent years, the use of GSM- or iridium based webcams and automatic weather stations has been spreading and by now, researchers of the University Center on Svalbard are able to view online weather data as well as webcam footage of their field station in Rijpfjorden on the north coast of Northeast Land. This is vital, especially for the evaluation of flight and landing conditions for helicopters.

At least they had been able to, until their weather and camera mast blew down... ;-(



So the walrus researchers were eager to employ that same technology to keep track of walrus beaches, with iridium-uplinked webcams on four or five remote but well-established walrus haul-out sites. Here is a link to their project proposal.



Well-established among walrus, but also among walrus-watchers, which typically come there as individual expeditioners or as tourists aboard an expedition cruise.

So the walrus researchers thought that this might be a great bonus for their proposal: let's monitor walrus online, and if tourists step into the picture, let's monitor them as well!

In a rather amusing development of this story, this prompted the local newspaper, notorious for its mix of small-town news ("who is currently on the day-care waiting list?") and self-absorbed leaders about everything from Global Change to Norwegian-Russian diplomacy since the Cold War, to launch a fierce counter-attack article as well as an online poll titled "Do you mind being watched by the Polar Institute when you are out on field trips?"

Not surprisingly, the poll currently favors the protesters (62%) against those who do not mind appearing in a webcam image (35%). The total number of voters so far: 399 ;-)

If you are interested, join the Svalbard Pages Forum for a discussion of this topic.

Svalbard Pages - Online Forum

If you are interested in ongoing affairs on Svalbard, check out this online forum.

There are a number of discussion and news threads, all about Svalbard, living there, tour possibilities, weather, gear etc.
There are even a few "true Svalbardians" i.e. residents participating there, so you can get first-hand info and updates.

Candy bar satellite phone with high-speed internet connection available

ABU DHABI, Aug. 22, 2006. — According to the company's website, Thuraya has just achieved a milestone when engineers made an high-speed Internet connection using a handheld satellite phone.



“We were able for the first time to browse the Internet and download files,” Thuraya Project Manager Mansoor Al Abd said.

His team used Thuraya’s second-generation handset, which is the world’s smallest and lightest satellite phone, to go online.

In addition to making voice calls, handset users can download information at speeds of up to 60Kbps and upload at about 15Kbps while ThurayaDSL subscribers can send or receive data at speeds of up to 144Kbps.

Thuraya will initially offer a basic GPRS service to the second-generation handset users for an additional fee. Plans are also underway for introducing a number of GPRS-based advanced features.

Too bad their "footprint" i.e. coverage does not contain any of our (Maria's and mine) current working areas: Arctic Norway (Svalbard, R) is outside, as well as NW Iceland (R+M), East Greenland(M+R), Northern and Northeastern Russia (M), and of course Antarctica (R)...




Back to Iridium, I am afraid...

So, what about a post-colonial Arctic?

Just as another thought, while I am in this "colonial" thing:

• Denmark's relationship to Greenland could certainly be described as "colonial", i.e. the Danish occupied it (only after some quarreling with the Norwegians, who claimed to have been there before, as Erik Raude (i.e. "the red") had settled southwest Greenland, and later Norway actively maintained human trapping outposts on North-East Greenland), and they both abused, relocated, exploited and "civilized" the native Inuit in best colonial style. Nowadays, Greenland has its "hjemmestyre" (home rule) with its own parliament, which even sends a few representatives to Denmark's parliament, but they seem to be quite content with their role of being a dependent part of the Danish kingdom. Realistically, they would not want to have to live without the substantial subsidies from the Danish gouvenment.

• Canada has a similar "mixed performance" track record with its Northwest Territories, but decided recently to allow the formation of a new Inuit-ruled territory, Nunavut.

• Norway has - as always - the smallest presence but the biggest ambitions of all the Polar players ;-) and while its sovereignty over Svalbard, that archipelago halfway between Scandinavia's North Cape and the North Pole is not resulting from formal colonial occupation, but stems from a history of coal mining "company towns", it is certainly going through something similar to a "post-colonial phase", as it transformed itself from being a (now state-owned and administrated) company town to a democratic society over the last few years. This transformation has many symptoms which again remind of post-colonial nations, like lack of proper administration and management personnel, a sudden reduction of financial resources and a somewhat inflated self-image.

• Russia - or rather the former Soviet Union - is maybe the area where (at least Polar) post-colonial fragmentation seems to be at the earliest stages only, although there are also attempts among the decimated, relocated and culturally diluted nations living in its Arctic territories to reorganize themselves and get a better representation of their cause.

the ARCTOS network

I have recently been invited to join the ARCTOS network, an international network for marine ecology in the Arctic.

ARCTOS is a consortium of scientists in Arctic marine productivity and ecology founded by Akvaplan-niva AS (APN), The University Centre in Svalbard (UNIS), Norwegian Polar Institute (NPI) and The University of Tromsø (UoT: Norwegian College of Fishery Science (NCFS) and Faculty of Science).

To visit me on the ARCTOS homepage, click this link.

Svalbard warmer than ever

According to official sources in the Norwegian weather service, Longyearbyen, the "capital" of the archipelago as well as its main port and airport, has measured a new a January record high temperature of 7.7 °C this monday morning.

If you read Norwegian and want to verify, you can click here.

Also Bjørnøya, or Bear Island, reached a record high in temperature observations, and while Longyearbyen's 7.7°C have last been measured as recently as 1996, Bjørnøya's value of 5.3°C has last been registered in January 1937.

Polar tourism - half expedition, half cruise, and a bit of science talk...

As you can see on my link above, I have been working for several types of tourist trips, so far mostly in the Svalbard archipelago and more recently on the Antarctic Peninsula. One of the main activities in these areas are polar cruises, at least when it comes to the number of passengers involved and the area covered by these activities. This led to the establishment of an International Association for Antarctic tour operators and a similar association for Arctic Expedition cruise operators (AECO) has recently been established as well.



Unfortunately, though, most cruise operators work with ships and schedules that are not designed for many stops or even landings, instead their programs are often mostly based on shipboard entertainment, while visits to islands or ports along the cruise track are an extra. Although these forms of travel certainly have their good sides and their luxury-cruise appeal, they are usually not very compatible with polar areas. For once, port facilities are rare in those areas, and visits have to be based on beach landing operations using tenders, often nicknamed zodiac operations by the brand name of the most commonly used inflatable dinghy or tender.



Travelling like this allows you to reach almost any interesting spot, whether it is a glacier front, a bird cliff, a remote beach strewn with whale bones, or any of the operating or historic scientific stations in the polar areas which are open and accessible to the public (most of them are, upon prior arrangement and due notification).
Uhm, come to think of it, probably not the Amundsen-Scott Station (at the South Pole) but those near the shores (where most of them are located, anyway).

Live cam from the South Pole

Having several zodiacs onboard at all times also facilitates scuba diving or snorkelling or simply cruising with your camera - or sketch block for those who have the drawing skills and enthusiam. Do not expect to reach very far inland, though, as most landings will have a limited time frame and will be set up more for a stroll or maybe a light hike than for serious climbing or trekking (so no overland trips to Amundsen-Scott either, sorry...). But then, this is for the specially interested, anyway...

The longest March - sounds tempting?

For those interested in diving into the icy waters of the Polar Oceans, serious preparation and relevant cold-water experience is a must, as this is not an environment suitable for much experimenting or even training with new or untested gear. On the other hand, if you are already comfortable in your dry suit and have been diving in cold water and (sometimes) a bit tougher conditions, can dress in and out of your gear inside a small boat and without a tender, and prefer to dive with your buddy rather than trail a guide in a flock of other divers, you should be just fine on any of the polar expedition cruise trips offering diving as an extra option.



Mind you, there will most likely not be any trips dedicated exclusively to diving, so you will always be able to combine some underwater time with a few landings or some other "topside activities", and more importantly, you will be able to bring your non-diving partners, something that these guys seem to have forgotten - and regretted...



Modern four-stroke outboard engines have largely replaced the more dynamic, but also more intrusive two-stroke engines that consume a lot more fuel while making more noise and exhaust pollution. So now you can still chat while cruising at full speed, or creep up to those seals at minimum speed while retaining full propulsion and responsiveness - in case the seals decide to come over and take a bite at your - ahem - inflatable...



Even in the unlikely event of one or several punctures, these boats are designed to stay afloat with only two out of the four large air chambers intact, while another three smaller air chambers making up the triple keel are meant to increase performance in high winds and at high speed.



Mix this with the comfort of warming up with a drink and a nice chat in the ship's lounge or bar afterwards, and maybe an evening lecture on the history of polar exploration, or about the wonders of life inside and under the sea ice, or the magnificent sea bird migrations, and you have a pretty good idea of what a day on an expedition cruise is made up of. And then if you least expect it, the sea holds yet another surprise for you...




To learn more about Polar Expedition cruises and destinations, visit Oceanwide Expeditions or a well-connected travel agency near you, like

Norden Tours - D
Exodus - UK
Beluga - NL
Adventure Associates - AUS
Big Animals - USA

Enough marketing! I will compile an archive of Polar impressions, cruising the North and the South, and it will be available
here on my website - soon ;-)

the last truck stop on the data highway

Hi again

Like I promised, there will again be some diary-style short stories posted about my travels and work in the Polar regions. Now, I have just returned to Longyearbyen, Svalbard, where part of my PhD work and a large part of my tourist guide experience originates.

Svalbard is an Arctic archipelago under Norwegian administration and has long been an adventurous outpost-like settlement where coal mining, whaling, fishing, and to some extent hunting and trapping have sustained small populations in up to four larger settlements as well as smaller stations and cabins throughout the area of some 60.000 sq km. For more info, visit the CIA ;-)

CIA - The World Factbook -- Svalbard

But, finally, the world has reached out and has now connected itself with even the last miner and trapper, whether they want it or not. A brand-new glass fibre cable connection from the Norwegian mainland now brings Gigabit data transfer capabilities (at least theoretically) right up to 78 °N.

Actually, the growing scientific community on the main island, Spitsbergen, has been in dire need of such a stable line with some significant bandwidth, especially since there is a satellite downlink station located just outside the main settlement, Longyearbyen, where I stay right now. Previously all data and communications connections to the mainland had been satellite-based as well, which was kind of absurd for the downlink station...

Check out the link to the station:

SvalSat-Svalbard Satellite Station Nowegian Space Centre

Even the northernmost community on Svalbard, Ny-Ålesund, also a former mining town which now markets itself as an "International Research Platform" is by now connected by an upgraded direct-beam radio link from Longyearbyen and should be getting something like 155 MBit/s of data through.

Ny-Ålesund LSF - General information about Ny-Ålesund

But there are even more exciting things down the pipeline in this area: the Russians, which by the way also support a good-sized coal mining settlement not far from Longyearbyen, have previously been the suspects of (real or imagined?) cold-war style scenarios, combining secret bases, transport helicopters that could be refitted with their original weaponry in a flash (?!), nuclear subs sneaking along the ice-covered coasts, etc. You get the idea.

But hey, now even these (admittedly still pretty scary) subs can be put to a 'good' purpose: one of them is scheduled to launch a refitted ballistic missile carrying a prototype of a solar-sail-powered spacecraft, er, next tuesday from somewhere in the Barents Sea (i.e. our "backyard").

Let's hope the thing takes off as scheduled and delivers its cargo to a nice orbit altitude (the last attempt seems to have - ehm - crashed in Kamtchatka). Here is the full story:

Wired News: Cosmos 1 Set to Test Solar Sail

And, by the way, let's hope they fire the right rocket, huh ?-)

how it all began...

hello world

finally I enter the world of blogs. Actually, this is almost something like a prequel to my website, which has been running since 1999 (www.rupert.krapp.org) and originated as an online diary of a year spent on Svalbard, an archipelago in the Arctic.

So, similar to the great success of other prequels which followed - and subsequently explained and gradually enhanced - the otherwise mediocre sequels released much earlier, I intend to rework the material of my Polar travels and adventures, as well as the "more serious" part of my scientific explorations and career. And yes, I have been watching Star Wars recently... ;-)

So here we go: begun again, this online diary has!