Van Mijenfjord
| Van Mijenfjord | ||
|---|---|---|
| Waters | Arctic Ocean | |
| Land mass | Spitzbergen (island) | |
| Geographical location | 77 ° 47 ' N , 15 ° 33' E | |
|
||
| width | 10 km | |
| length | 50 km | |
The Van Mijenfjord ( Norwegian Van Mijenfjorden ) is a 50 km long and 10 km wide fjord on the island of Spitsbergen in Svalbard . It is the northern arm of the Bellsund and thus delimits Nordenskiöld-Land to the south and Nathorst-Land to the north. At its northeastern end is the Braganzavågen bay (after Aldegonda, Princess of Braganza , who herself took part in an expedition to Svalbard in 1892), where the mining settlement of Sveagruva is located. Its northeastern end is called Rindersbukta (after Michiel Rinders, a Danish whaling captain ).
Van Mijenfjord is bounded by the island of Akseløya for practically the entire width of its mouth , so that only two narrow straits connect the fjord with the North Atlantic. For this reason, the water in the fjord is relatively calm and freezes over early in winter, which in turn makes it impossible to transport the coal extracted in Sveagruva in winter.
Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld wanted to dedicate this fjord to Willem Van Muyden , the head of the Danish whaling fleet from 1612 to 1613, but was wrong about the spelling of the name. The name has remained in the wrong spelling to this day. Van Muydenbukta , a bay north of the Bellsund, bears the name in the correct spelling. Other, now historical names for the Van Mijenfjord are Lowe Sound (Poole 1610, Fotherby 1613) with different spellings; Kloeck river - the fjord was thought to be the delta of a river - (Blaeu 1623 et al.); Bell River (Scoresby 1820); Dry Fjord - because Braganzavågen partially dries out at low tide - (Keilhau 1831).
Literature and Sources
- Van Mijenfjorden . In: The Place Names of Svalbard (first edition 1942). Norsk Polarinstitutt , Oslo 2001, ISBN 82-90307-82-9 (English, Norwegian).