Jones Sound
Geographical location
The Jonessund (english Jones Sound, French Détroit de Jones ) is a strait in the Canadian Arctic. It connects Baffin Bay with the Norwegian Bay and runs between Iceland Devon in the south and Ellesmere Iceland in the north. It is over 200 km long and between 40 and 80 km wide.
Geography
The Jonessund follows the 76th degree of north latitude in its entire length. Its outputs are constrained by large islands, Coburg Iceland in the East and North Kent Iceland in the northwest. The access from the Baffin Bay is by the Glacier Strait north of Coburg Iceland or south of it made possible by the Lady Ann Strait. Both straits are about 30 km wide. The additions in the northwest are much narrower. The Hell Gate ( German " Gates of Hell " ) is between Twin Rivers Point ( North Kent Iceland ) and Cape Donninghausen ( Ellesmere Iceland ), only 4.4 km wide, the Cardigan Strait between North Kent and Devon Iceland Iceland about 8 km. The coasts of the Jonessunds are mostly steep, because both the Ellesmere Island and Devon Island are formed by the mountains of the Arctic Cordillera. Fjords reach deep into the partially glaciated interior of the two islands. The most important are Starnes Fiord, Grise Fiord, Harbour Fiord, South Cape Fiord, Baad Fiord, Muskox Fiord, Goose Fiord and Walrus Fiord in the north and west and Viks Fiord Fiord in the West.
Wildlife
The Jonessund is visited during the summer of walruses, narwhals and white. All year are here ringed seals, harp seals, bearded seals and polar bears to be found. The Polynias at both outputs of the Jonessunds offer a large number of seabirds enough food to breed here.
At the output of Jonessunds in the Baffin Bay, the Nirjutiqavvik National Wildlife Area is located. Six areas have been designated as Important Bird Area (IBA ). So Skruis Point applies ( NU054 ) as the largest breeding area of the black guillemot in the Arctic. On the rocks of Cape Vera ( NU053 ) nest about 11,000 pairs of Eissturmvogels, also 300 pairs of eider and glaucous gulls, terns and Thayermöwen. More IBAs are Cambridge Point ( NU010 ) on Coburg Iceland, Sydkap Icefield ( NU055 ) on Ellesmere Iceland, North Iceland Kent ( NU052 ) and Eastern Devon Iceland ( NU057 ).
History
On the coasts of Jonessunds be found numerous remains of prehistoric settlement from the Dorset and pre- Dorset - time, especially tent rings. When the first Europeans reached him, there was but no Inuit settlements.
In search of a north-western sea route to China and India Robert Bylot and William Baffin discovered on July 10, 1616 entrance to Jonessund, which they named one of their clients by Alderman Jones. Baffin, as well as 200 years later John Ross, considered the Jonessund for a bay.
The first part went down with his ship in the Jonessund, Thomas Lee was. The captain of the whaler Prince of Wales claimed to have penetrated 1848 150 miles in the Sound. In the search for the Franklin expedition William Penny and Horatio Austin found the entrance to the Sound, in the years 1850 and 1851 blocks of ice. Edward Inglefield in 1852 had more favorable ice conditions. He came out of the Baffin Bay in the Jonessund and explored the North Devon Coast Iceland to the Cape Sparbo (84 ° 10 'W).
The second Norwegian polar expedition with the Fram, the 1898-1902 Canadian islands explored west of Ellesmere Island under the direction of Otto Sverdrup, wintered three times in Jonessund first 1899/1900 in Harbour Fiord and then twice in the Goose Fiord. On extended trips by dogsled the west coast of Ellesmere Island were recorded and discovered the Sverdrup Islands. The expedition members Gunnar Isachsen and Edvard Bay mapped the parts of the Jonessunds which were unknown until then.
After his sleigh on which he wanted to have reached the North Pole, wintered Frederick Cook in 1908 /09 at the Cape Sparbo.
1922 advised the Royal Canadian Mounted Police on the south coast of Ellesmere Island Outpost Craig Harbour one. 1956 this was moved to Grise Fiord, where in 1953 an Inuit settlement had been established. To date, Grise Fiord is the only permanently inhabited settlement on Jonessund.