FREE Weather summary Cloudy and partly cloudy with occasional snow and temperatures near -10C through next week. icepeople Full forecast page 3 The world's northernmost alternative newspaper Vol. 9, Issue 1 January 3, 2017 www.icepeople.net 'Longyearbyen at its best:' Modern SVALBARD'S 10 STRANGEST STORIES OF 2016 tragedies, triumphs part of traditional tributes during Syttende Mai celebration Page 7 “ To believe that the governor can rescue people out, regardless of circumstances, is wrong. There is no guarantee for that. - Per Andreassen, police lieutenant Svalbard governor's office ” Late update: 12 apartments vacated again due to building, infrastructure damage. icepeople.net GREENPEACE BRITISH ANTARCTIC SURVEY MARK SABBATINI / ICEPEOPLE A pianist on a glacier, a research vessel suffering from an identity crisis and a gigantic mailbox belonging to the outlaw Santa kept things weird in 2016. WIGGINGWIGGING OUTOUT See DOCK, page 12 Boaty McBoatface, Aquaman, Pokémon among stars in Svalbard's version of the year of surreality By MARK SABBATINI will of the people. A political ad where an in- yet again. Nuclear armageddon, yet again. Editor nocent little girl was obliterated by a weapon When it came to the ways we were weird, A travesty of an election that ignored the of mass destruction. Battling alien invaders, See SURREAL, page 6 Related coverage: • Letters to the Future: grope and change...7 Stormy sendoff • Fleeing Svalbard is easy – sort of……....11 Blizzard buries cars and homes, exposes kindness and resolve By MARK SABBATINI fatal avalanche a year ago. But it didn't cause Editor any tragedies and, while many experienced has- ROLF STANGE MAKSYM BOREIKO Of course, 2016 had to screw us over one sles and minor damage, it was also indiciative A tourist is dwarfed by a drift near Spitsbergen last time with a storm resembling that from the See STORM, page 4 Hotel after a major snowstorm last week. Russian troope arrivesSee REALITY, Topping page 4 the charts Musseling in Getting lit IMAGE COURTESTY OF SNØHETTA Things get Record heat, Creatures Lots and lots of A twin-dock floating pier, seen here in an artist's curiouser in precipitation in arriving from spirits for the illustration, is being proposed for Longyearbyen. Barentsburg 2016 Mediterranean holidays Page 2 Page 3 Page 9 Page 12 https://us- mg6.mail.yahoo.c om/neo/ launch?.rand=epm v8hf4ja5bp# Page 2 January 3, 2017 Who's to blame and how So…2017 is going to be very, very curious too to express your wrath Editor Mark Sabbatini Bag lady Marion Prudhon Principal of principles Kristan Hutchison Psychiatrist Irene Gallion Accomplice Jeff Newsom Mailing address Icepeople Vei 210 -2- 13 Longyearbyen, Svalbard 9170 Norway Telephone GRUMANT SVALBARD Norway: +47 41 51 46 38 Barentsburg residents perform a scene during the debut of their new theater production based on U.S. +1 (970) 673-4472 "Alice in Wonderland" in the Russian settlement's performing arts center on Dec. 30. The production, which will be featured during the 2017 tourism season, features an ensemble of more PRIVATE E-mail than 60 people. More photos from the performance are available at tinyurl.com/zmrsgdb. [email protected] Web site www.icepeople.net Icesheet Icepeople is published weekly (or thereabouts) Random bits of the week's weirdness: on Tuesdays (or thereabouts), with printed Since this week's fishwrapper is pretty much copies available free on a limited basis in all about random weirdness, it seems fitting to Longyearbyen. Additional printed copies are start this space off with an item that conve- available locally and by mail upon request. niently combines some of the more eye-open- Charges are on an "at cost" basis. ing stats of the past week. We've run stuff all Briefly year about record-high heat and precipitation, Copyright stuff and record-low sea ice, so the record year-end figures weren't in themselves all that shocking Cruising: Getting out of Original contents of this publication can be to us. But even so it did boggle our tiny minds reproduced for non-commercial purposes free to read the "Dec. 19-like" storm that hit last danger, but into 'death?' of charge if Icepeople is credited as the week pushed the edge of Svalbard's ice sheet NORWEGIAN METEORLOGICAL INSTITUTE Another cruise season is about to embark source. The original writers, photographers 60 to 70 kilometers further north, according Life on the edge? No sweat: All you have to do full speed ahead in Svalbard, but the smiles of Mainland town claims to be top and other contributors retain their rights to all to the Norwegian Metereorlogial Institute. is walk at a pace of four km/h for 18 straight hours those greeting passengers aren't being shared published works. Junk scientists will of course say this is one of to keep from falling into the sea as a gale-force by a lot of industry executives these days. per-person telethon giver, a title those accelerating and cumulative climate blizzard nibbles away the ice sheet. They took a blow last month when Britain held by Longyearbyen for years Corrections policy change things that happen when extreme ing polar bear, reindeer, walruses, and seals — issued a warning telling travelers cruising here weather and waves meet the extremely thin ice and few tourists…Of course, with the threat of is too dangerous. That warning may be re- When we screw up you'll know about it – on that has replaced the thicker stuff from past polar bears, carrying a firearm is recommen- the front page. One of the big complaints days. But those who speak post-truth to power ded." Oh, the outdated places you'll go with this about newspapers is they tend to bury know it just means the Creator really, really advice (and won't when you learn a weapon is corrections and clarifications deep inside wants us to stick lots more holes in the ocean more than "recommended") … But 'tis the sea- where few people who read the original article floor so we can watch all that oil come out … son for annual travel articles – often written af- see them. If we need to fix something, an alert Or maybe he (no PC gender iffyness here) is ter "hosted" trips by tourism companies, often box on the front page will state what story is in just opening more waters for ships carrying written by desktop globetrotters repeating each error and where the full correction is printed. tourists since we barely have any right now. So others' cliches – and most seem to contain at says Smarter Travels in an article headlined least a glitch or two. Such as India's Economic "Ten Secret Places To Go Before Everyone Times in an article (tinyurl.com/z8hfrd5) Submitting material Else" (tinyurl.com/zyngqmt). The text is per- about five no-go zones around the world fect for looking to set the clock back to the days (flashback: a couple months ago someone actu- Letters, columns, photos and other material when icky things like gay marriage and "happy ally stated this place has been overrun by Mus- are welcome, but we can't offer pay for holidays" were taboo: "With Iceland now in- lims). In this case, it was just another article published items since nobody here is getting creasingly attracting travellers, thanks in part to about the Doomsday Vault, with the assertion paid at the moment. Submissions in electronic free stopovers from Icelandair and Wow Air that "only a designated researcher or plant form (text, Word documents, JPEGs, etc.) are (um, we were taking advantage of this 15 years breeder can enter the facility." Which doesn't highly preferred, although typing and/or ago), it’s time to look elsewhere for a crowd- seem too absurd until you start looking at all scanning of items will be considered on a per- free Nordic vacation. And while Svalbard… those pictures and documentaries of media case basis. We reserve the right to edit doesn’t currently have any free stopover…it folks, celebrities and other not-always-VIP submissions for length, clarity, accuracy, libel does offer unique scenery and wildlife – includ- types taking the somewhat regular tours there. January 3, 2017 Page 3 HEADLINES STOLEN FROM SVALBARDPOSTEN VERDENS NORDLIGSTE AVIS Svalbard Airport gets electric cars, public charging station Svalbard Airport has obtained two new electric-powered cars and plans to install pub- lic charging stations this summer. The cars, replace two gas-powered vehicles used by the airport, are being purchased now due to the recent installation of solar panels at the facili- ty. "Previously, we have not quite seen the NORWEGIAN METEORLOGICAL INSTITUTE point of electric cars because the power still A chart shows temperatures at Svalbard Airport this year (blue and red line) were constantly above came from coal-fired power plant," said Oper- the historical average (black line). In addition, precipitation (blue bars) was far above average. ations Manager Carl Einar Ianssen. "When we got solar panels installed at the airport this summer it was more natural to go to the pur- chase of electric cars." The panels should pro- Frighteningly normal vide sufficient power for the vehicles and the charging station, he said. The airport received Record high temperatures in Lie wrote. 230,000 kroner from the Svalbard Environ- The situation in Longyearbyen is hardly mental Protection Fund to build the charging 2016 continue a trend for unique. The average global temperature record station. In addition, parent company Avinor Longyearbyen and Earth also set a new high in 2016, as did virtually ev- provided 450,000 kroner for the project.