North Kent Island

Template: Infobox Island / Maintenance / image missing

North Kent Iceland is one of the Queen Elizabeth Islands in Nunavut, Canada.

Geography

The island lies on the northwestern exit of the Jonessunds between the Colin Archer Peninsula Devon Island and the Simmons Peninsula of Ellesmere Island. It is separated from Ellesmere Island by 4-6 km wide Hellgate, from the Devon Island by the Cardigan Strait. North Kent Iceland is about 41 kilometers long and in the northern part up to 22 km wide. It has an area of 590 km ². The flattened island plateau reached in the south a height of about 600 meters above sea level and is always here of a 150 square kilometer ice cap. The coasts fall steeply into the sea. Only in the shallower north the island is shallow on the Norwegian Bay.

Nature

The North Kent Island is recognized by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area ( NU052 ). On the cliffs at Hell Gate and Calf Iceland, which is upstream of the island to the southeast, nesting thousands of seabirds. Mentioned are the black guillemot, common eider, the glaucous gull and the Thayermöwe. As the sea is not completely freezes over in the Hell Gate and Cardigan Strait in winter, some birds can even spend the winter here. In adjacent waters marine mammals such as walrus, ringed seals, bearded seals, narwhals and belugas live. Also, the polar bear is to be found here.

History

The island was discovered by Edward Belcher in search of the lost Franklin expedition in May 1852. The area has been carefully researched by the Norwegian Second Fram Expedition 1898-1902 and mapped. Otto Sverdrup reached the island by dogsled on 13 April 1900.