Heiss Island
Template: Infobox Island / Maintenance / image missing
The Hayes Island (Russian остров Хейса / Ostrow Cheisa, english Hayes Iceland or hot Iceland ) is an island belonging to Russia archipelago Franz Josef Land. In the north- east of the island, the Geophysical Observatory ET Krenkel, one of the two Russian polar stations located on Franz Josef Land.
Geography
The Hayes island is 132 km ² area of the smaller islands of Franz Josef land. It is surrounded by the archipelago north of Hall Island and southeast of the Champ and the Salisbury Island. In the northeast, the Wiener -Neustadt Island and in the East the Wilczek Island is located. Lie north is the small Fersman Island. At the Hayes Island Markham Sound meets the Austriasund.
The Hayes Island is relatively flat and free of ice except for a situated on the north coast ice cap of about five kilometers in diameter. The south coast is dominated by basalt cliffs. Most of the island is but covered by sediment deposits. In the northeast there is a volcanic crater lake.
Climate
On the island there is a maritime Hayes Arctic climate. The mean annual temperature is -12 ° C. July, only an average temperature above the freezing point. In the summer months it is often foggy. The average humidity is about 80 year-round, in the summer months over 90%. Year-round blow strong winds on the island, mainly in winter from the east, in the summer from the northwest.
Flora and Fauna
The vegetation is sparse on the Hayes Island. There occur mainly lichens and mosses. The most common vascular plant is the Arctic Poppy. On the island breed eiders, sea beach runners, Arctic skuas, terns, snow buntings and ivory gulls. In addition, fulmars, Red-throated Diver, Great Skuas, Spatelraubmöwen, glaucous gulls, kittiwakes, auks and guillemots were observed.
History
The island was sighted in 1874 by the Austria -Hungarian North Polar Expedition, but Julius Payer thought she was a peninsula of Hall Island. 1898 she was appointed by Members of the Wellman expedition to the American polar explorer Isaac Israel Hayes.
On the Hayes Island is located since 1957 a polar station. From 1965 it was expanded to the largest weather observatory in the Arctic. At times, working up to 200 scientists here. From 1956 to 1990, from the island of 1,950 sounding rockets launched, for example, the type MR -12.
In honor of the Russian polar explorer Ernst Krenkel Theodorowitsch the station was named Geophysical Observatory ET Krenkel on the Hayes Island in 1972. In 2001, a fire destroyed the power equipment and some buildings. As part of the International Polar Year 2007/2008, the research station was built on the Hayes Island by a Russian- American cooperation again.