Ebeltofthafen geophysical observatory

Ebeltofthafen geophysical observatory
Ebeltofthafen geophysical observatory
Coordinates	79 ° 9 '  N , 11 ° 36'  E Coordinates: 79 ° 9 '  N , 11 ° 36'  E
Basic data
Country
founding	1912
Photograph of the observatory (1913)

The Ebeltofthafen Geophysical Observatory was a German research station on Svalbard on the Mitra Peninsula, the southernmost part of Albert I Land in the north-west of the island. It was one of the first continuously operated observation stations in the Arctic for several years (1912–1914) .

history

Ebeltofthafen had already been selected as the location of a future observatory on the Spitsbergen expedition Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelins in 1910. Zeppelin carried out this ship expedition with the aim of scientifically and technically preparing a polar flight of his airship . He was accompanied and advised by Hugo Hergesell , Chairman of the International Aeronautical Commission, and the polar explorer Erich von Drygalski , among others . As little was known about the meteorological conditions in the Arctic, especially at the altitude of an airship, a permanent station was to be set up for continuous aerological measurements. As a temporary solution , Hergesell founded the German Geophysical Observatory Adventbai as early as 1911 in a building at the local coal mine. In the summer of 1912, the Ebeltofthafen geophysical observatory was finally built on the Krossfjord .

Kurt Wegener was appointed as the first director of the observatory and Max Robitzsch as his research assistant . They were supported by two assistants. The two-story main building, which also contained a radio station , was completed in July 1912 after a three-week construction period. The station also included a storage shed, a small balloon hall and a small rotatable house in which the kite winds were housed. A weather station was built on the nearby 590 m high Mont de la Brise . Another observation point was set up at Cape Mitra, 7 km away.

In February and March 1913, Wegener started two rescue expeditions for the troubled members of the German Schröder-Stranz expedition, whose ship Herzog Ernst was stuck in the ice in Sorge Bay. In two trapper huts he found messages from expedition members who had tried to reach inhabited areas, but now announced their decision to return to the ship. In the end, Wegener was unable to help despite his great personal commitment.

In the summer of 1913 the crew of the observatory changed. The observations have now been made by Dr. Hoffmann and Otto Stoll (1885–1923) continued. After their wintering, they were scheduled to be replaced in the summer of 1914 by Max Robitzsch as director and Friedrich Herath (1889–1974) as observer. However, with the outbreak of the First World War , this did not happen. Hoffmann and Stoll managed to return home by way of Norway by autumn 1914. A year later, a British naval association is said to have destroyed the observatory.

During the Second World War , the Wehrmacht installed weather stations twice in the nearby Lilliehöökfjord ( company Knospe , company Nussbaum ). The meteorological measurement series can thus be directly compared with those from Ebeltofthafen.

Scientific work 1912/13

The scientific program primarily provided for meteorological observations at the main station. Air temperature, humidity and pressure were recorded three times a day. In addition, the researchers observed the wind speed and direction as well as the cloud cover. In addition, the air temperature was recorded for almost a year at Mont de la Brise and 3.5 months at Cape Mitra. Wegener and Robitzsch also made a variety of aerological measurements. They carried out a total of 275 pilot balloon probes, with a maximum height of 14,000 meters being reached. In addition, there were 98 balloon ascents that led up to an altitude of 5,460 meters. Probing with the help of dragons was less successful. With only 19 ascents, heights up to a maximum of 1,590 m were reached. The location of the observatory was not very suitable for kite sounding. They could only be carried out with a southerly wind because the atmospheric turbulence in other wind directions was so great that kites and recording devices were lost. Overall, extensive representative data was collected, which is of great value when compared with current measurements for estimating the warming in the Arctic.

Another goal of the expedition was to observe the northern lights . Based on a total of 69 parallax measurements , which were carried out simultaneously at the main station and at Cape Mitra, the heights of the observed northern lights (70 to 200 km) could be determined.

literature

• Cornelia Lüdecke: Historical weather stations on Spitsbergen - a visit in summer 2000 (PDF; 1.8 MB). In: Polarforschung 71, 2001, pp. 49-56.
• Hans Steinhagen : Course and results of the Spitzbergen expedition by K. Wegener and M. Robitzsch, 1912-1913. ( Memento from March 11, 2018 in the Internet Archive ) Meteorologentagung DACH 2007, Hamburg 10. – 14. September 2007 (PDF; 4.0 MB).
• Hans Steinhagen: Researcher, adventurer, rescuer - the Spitsbergen expeditions by Kurt Wegener, Herbert Schröder-Stranz and Theodor Lerner 1912/1913 . In: Cornelia Lüdecke, Kurt Brunner (Ed.): From A (ltenburg) to Z (eppelin). German research on Spitzbergen until 1914. 100 years of the expedition of Duke Ernst II of Saxony-Altenburg (PDF; 31.8 MB). Neubiberg 2012 ( series of publications by the Institute for Geodesy at the University of the Federal Armed Forces, Munich 88), pp. 47–58.

Web links

• Kurt Wegener and Max Robitzsch: Climatological monitoring of dates during the wintering of 1912/1913 . In: Publications of the German Observatory Ebeltofthafen - Spitzbergen , No. 5, Vieweg, Braunschweig 1916, digitized version of the course of the temperatures at the Observatory Ebeltofthafen from July 1912 to July 1913: doi: 10.1594 / PANGEA.711054

Individual evidence

1. ^ Wilhelm Dege: German Observatory Ebeltofthafen - Spitzbergen. On the 50th return of the first wintering in 1912/13 (PDF; 893 kB). In: Polarforschung 32, 1962, pp. 136-140.
2. ↑ H. Wichmann: Destruction of the German meteorological station on Spitzbergen . In: Petermanns Geogr. Mitt. 6, 1915, p. 442.
3. ↑ Rupert Holzapfel : German Polar Research 1940/45 (PDF; 1.7 MB). In: Polarforschung 21 (2), 1951, pp. 85-97.