Sverdrup Channel
Geographical location
The Sverdrup Channel (English Sverdrup Channel) is a strait in the Canadian territory of Nunavut. Located in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, he separates Meighen Iceland in eastern Axel Heiberg Iceland in the west.
Geography
The Sverdrup Channel begins at the imaginary line between Perley Iceland at the northern tip of Meighen Iceland in the west and Bad Weather Cape at the entrance of Li Fiord on the east and 65 km to the south extends to the Fay Islands. On some maps it extends for 150 km to the northern tip of Amund Ringnes Iceland, where it merges into the Massey sound. At its narrowest point the Sverdrup Channel is 41 km wide. On its eastern side open several fjords. The largest are the North and the Middle Fiord. In addition to lying in the middle of the channel Fay Islands, there are other small islands off the coast of Axel Heiberg Iceland.
The Sverdrup Channel remains covered even in the summer months of a five -meter-thick layer of ice. In particularly warm summers such as 1998, the Ice Barrier can also break up under the influence of the wind, however. The flow in the Sverdrup Channel runs in a southeasterly direction and leads water polar origin. 2.3 m below the ice was a maximum speed of 0.5 knots ( 0.9 km / h ) were measured.
History
In May 1900 the first Europeans reached the Sverdrup Channel: Otto Sverdrup led a expedition by dogsled from the past in Jonessund Fram Coming on the west coast of Axel Heiberg Iceland along. Probably crossed Frederick Cook in 1908 as the first channel. A card that was made, according to the Inuit who accompanied him, an island shows west of Axel Heiberg Iceland, the Meighen Iceland is very similar in size, shape and position. Cook has never complained about the discovery of the island on which he should have rested a night for themselves. Officially Meighen Iceland and the west side of the channel were therefore not discovered until 1916 by Vilhjálmur Stefánsson. The first recorded crossing of the Sverdrup Channel succeeded Hans Krüger 1930.