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Arctic Circle & Iceland Geography · Acedra
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Arctic Circle & Iceland Geography
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0:03
The Arctic Circle is the line above which you get midnight sun at least one day a year. And also where you get one day where the sun doesn't peek above the horizon at all. But despite its reputation for being cold and northern, Iceland is not above the Arctic Circle. Well, most of it isn't. There is one part of a tiny island called Grímsey, north of Akureyri, which is where I am now. Grímsey is home to fewer than a hundred people and way more than a hundred puffins. And it's a good story.
0:32
I was going to travel there, I was going to see the monument they built at the Arctic Circle line. But because the earth wobbles on its axis, the Arctic Circle is moving north. So there's now a new monument: an eight-tonne spherical stone boulder that they can move every year as the line moves. In about fifty years, they'll probably have to move it into the ocean, because the Arctic Circle will have left the island of Grímsey for a few millennia.
0:55
And Iceland, so my story went, will no longer have any territory above the Arctic Circle. Decent story, right? But then I found that there's another bit of Iceland above the Arctic Circle, another 60km or so further north. A small, uninhabitable bit of rock called Kolbeinsey. And that's the sort of technicality I have to pay attention to, if I don't want several hundred emails pointing out that I'm wrong. And so, the story about Grimsey sort of fell apart, it didn't work any more.
1:23
Except, there's one line on the Wikipedia article about that small, uninhabitable bit of rock. "It is subject to rapid wave erosion, "and is expected to disappear in the near future, "probably around the year 2020." The trouble is, there's no way for a tourist to get out to Kolbeinsey. It's just a tiny bit of rock. To see if it's still there, you'd have to charter a plane. So I chartered a plane!
1:51
We're flying out, right now, to the co-ordinates of where Kolbeinsey might be. Or might not be. Here's what I know: in the 17th century, Kolbeinsey was about 700m by 100m, and about 100m tall. It was the massive remnant of an old volcanic eruption. But it's been steadily, constantly eroded by the ocean, by freeze/thaw cycles, and by sea ice in winter. By 1986, it was only about 40m by 40m, and it only reached about 5m above the waves. Iceland built a helipad on there to try to stop it eroding,
2:25
but in 2006 the Coast Guard here reported that the helipad had collapsed. Iceland isn't reinforcing Kolbeinsey any more: they seem to have abandoned it to the waves. And it might not seem like that matters. But tiny places like that can make a difference, because countries' territorial limits and exclusive fishing areas are sometimes decided by rocks like that. In the mid-20th century, the UK and Iceland had what the British media dramatically called the "Cod Wars",
2:53
disputes about fishing rights near Iceland. And by the way, Iceland won. The UK conceded. Now, Kolbeinsey is mentioned in legal documents about Iceland's territorial limits, but I'm also not really sure whether it matters. To work out what's going to happen when it disappears, you'd need an expert in international maritime law and, frankly, a psychic, because the answer likely is: it gets settled by negotiations between governments,
3:19
not by some rando in a plane going "hey, your island isn't there any more!" But it does feel a bit provocative for me, as a British person, to be checking up on whether Iceland's rock is still there. All right. We are approaching the co-ordinates. We are flying only 500 feet above the waves, that's about 150m. It's low tide. The weather is clear. If there was ever a chance to see if Kolbeinsey is still there, this is it.
3:52
I think I can see it! I'm pretty sure that's it up ahead. Oh, man, there's barely anything.
4:07
That used to be an island 700m by 100m, and that's all that's left. And yes, it's eroded away, but it looks like predictions were a little bit pessimistic. There's two little islands still poking above the water. Importantly, it is still there, at low tide it is still above the waves. Iceland, your island is still there. You're welcome! This video was inspired by some tweets from Sam Hughes, a brilliant science fiction author. I recommend his books Ra and Fine Structure,
4:38
he's also responsible for the Antimemetics Division stories over on the SCP Wiki. I've linked to his work in the description. Sam, thank you very much.
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