Copenhagen (dpa) – The supposedly northernmost island in the world is actually an iceberg. This is what scientists from Denmark and Switzerland discovered, who examined an island discovered in 2021 along with other islands north of Greenland. Researcher Rene Forsberg told Danish science mediator Videnskab.dk this week that there is water under the “islands” and that they are in fact flat icebergs covered with earth and gravel on the surface.
Forsberg confirmed this information to the German Press Agency. All reported island sites have been visited since 1978 – it became clear that they could not be islands.
Search continues
Scientists, explorers, and others have been searching for new islands in North Greenland for a long time. A Swiss-Danish research team made a special discovery a little over a year ago: they named the island, which is about 30 x 60 meters in size, Qeqertaq Avannarleq, which means something like “the northernmost island”. It was 800 meters north of Oodaaq Island, which was discovered in 1978 at the northernmost tip of Greenland and was previously considered the piece of land closest to the North Pole.
However, the researchers decided that it could not be more accurately described as an island either. Accordingly, another island called Inuit Qeqertaat located at 83°39’55″N, 30°37’45″W is the northernmost island on Earth.
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 220910-99-703411 / 2
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