A climate-change frontier in the world's northernmost town

A climate-change frontier in the world's northernmost town

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Icebergs float like doomed islands past the small boat as it makes its way through a fjord filled with the slush of a melting glacier. Occasionally, as the warming waters dissolve the bottom of one of the icebergs, it becomes top-heavy and does a somersault, as if it were playing instead of dying.

. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay
The Wahlenberg Glacier.

The Wahlenberg glacier above the fjord naturally calves, sheering off the icebergs into the water. But here it is happening at an increasing rate because of the warming ocean waters, says Kim Holmen, the international director of the Norwegian Polar Institute.

Holmen, wearing a woollen hat with a hot-pink pom-pom against the chill of an Arctic summer day, has lived in the northern Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard for three decades. He describes the changes he's seen as "profound, large and rapid."

. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay
Holmen relaxes with a cup of tea as he travels past the Wahlenberg Glacier.

"We are losing the Svalbard we know. We are losing the Arctic as we know it because of climate change," he says amid the constant crackle and trickle of the ice dissolving. "This is a forewarning of all the hardship and problems that will spread around the planet."

Since 1970, average annual temperatures have risen by 4 degrees Celsius in Svalbard, with winter temperatures rising more than 7 degrees, according to a report released by the Norwegian Centre for Climate Services in February. The "Climate in Svalbard 2100" report also warns that the annual mean air temperature in Svalbard is projected to increase by 7 to 10 degrees Celsius by the end of this century.

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Slideshow

A reindeer grazes.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

A reindeer grazes.

A pile of antlers on a ski sled.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

A pile of antlers on a ski sled.

A sign warns of the danger from polar bears.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

A sign warns of the danger from polar bears.

A woman poses next to a polar bear mural.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

A woman poses next to a polar bear mural.

A man looks at rugs for sale in a store.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

A man looks at rugs for sale in a store.

A man relaxes in the afternoon sun.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

A man relaxes in the afternoon sun.

The Svalbard Church, known as the northernmost church in the world.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

The Svalbard Church, known as the northernmost church in the world.

Newlywed Astrid Bjorlo and Ruben Nygaard met thirty years ago on the island and returned to marry surrounded by friends and family, in the Svalbard Church.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

Newlywed Astrid Bjorlo and Ruben Nygaard met thirty years ago on the island and returned to marry surrounded by friends and family, in the Svalbard Church.

People dine at a restaurant.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

People dine at a restaurant.

Miner Bent Jakobsen works inside the Gruve 7 mine, the only remaining operational coal mine on Svalbard. Jakobsen has worked in the mine for almost 14 year. He said he grew up in the family of miners. "Longyearbyen was founded because of coal mining, and we are fading out.. Coal mining here is a super-long tradition. Around here everything is dependent on the coal miners, so without us, what do we have left? We have tourism. Well, tourism pollutes too," Jakobsen said. "I do hear everything they say about climate change, but I know from the past we have had super-mild winters, especially on Svalbard. It goes in cycles. We need coal for making cars and cellphones and so forth, but that is what people don't think about. We don't have any good substitution yet."
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

Miner Bent Jakobsen works inside the Gruve 7 mine, the only remaining operational coal mine on Svalbard. Jakobsen has worked in the mine for almost 14 year. He said he grew up in the family of miners. "Longyearbyen was founded because of coal mining, and we are fading out.. Coal mining here is a super-long tradition. Around here everything is dependent on the coal miners, so without us, what do we have left? We have tourism. Well, tourism pollutes too," Jakobsen said. "I do hear everything they say about climate change, but I know from the past we have had super-mild winters, especially on Svalbard. It goes in cycles. We need coal for making cars and cellphones and so forth, but that is what people don't think about. We don't have any good substitution yet."

A miner works inside the Gruve 7 mine.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

A miner works inside the Gruve 7 mine.

Miner Odd Rune Svenning, 26, has worked in the Gruve 7 mine for two years. "It's an old tradition working here. We are the last ones," he said. "I don't know if this affects the climate, but for us it is sad. We need coal, and for us to get it out is maybe safer or better for both the people working there and the climate."
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

Miner Odd Rune Svenning, 26, has worked in the Gruve 7 mine for two years. "It's an old tradition working here. We are the last ones," he said. "I don't know if this affects the climate, but for us it is sad. We need coal, and for us to get it out is maybe safer or better for both the people working there and the climate."

The town of Longyearbyen.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

The town of Longyearbyen.

An aerial view shows snow-covered mountains in Svalbard.
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

An aerial view shows snow-covered mountains in Svalbard.

Since 1979, the Arctic sea ice extent has declined by nearly 12% per decade, with the most pronounced winter reduction in the Svalbard and Barents Sea area.

That's not good news for Svalbard's main town, Longyearbyen. With a population of slightly more than 2,000 people, it is the northernmost town on the planet.

It is also the fastest-warming.

. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay
Wooden gravestones.

Rows of simple white wooden crosses cling to a hillside over Longyearbyen, a sparse cemetery that appears vulnerable even on a sunny day in August.

Ivar Smedsroed is the summer vicar at Svalbard Church, a red wooden building with white trim and a weathervane-topped bell tower. Inside the Lutheran house of worship, which claims to be the world's northernmost church, stained glass paints the snow-topped mountains nearby in a pastel hue.

The pastor has only been here for the summer, but in that short time he has already learned of people's fears about the effects of a rapidly changing climate.

One such effect is a thawing of the permafrost beneath his feet at the graveyard, which he calls "a place of memories, a place of remembrance."

. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay
Smedsroed changes the hymn board ahead of a mass.

"As the permafrost thaws, things that are in the ground tend to be pulled up," Smedsroed says matter-of-factly as he sits on the ground near the graves. "That is happening more or less all of the time, so we might see that the graves literally come up, the coffins."

There has been talk of relocating the graveyard after a landslide missed wiping it out by meters in October 2016. Nearly three years later, slabs of rock form a slash in the landscape just beyond the graves.

"Because of climate change and the difference that makes to the soil and the ground, some of the graves that we see behind us might end up actually sliding into the road," says Smedsroed, whose gray hair matches the woolen sweater beneath his white collar. "Or the next thing that we could see is that they might all be covered in the next big landslide coming down the hill."

. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay
Children play at the skatepark in the town of Longyearbyen.

Thawing permafrost isn't just a problem for the dead: It has caused problems for current residents of Longyearbyen too.

Houses in the valley are built on small wooden stilts instead of deep foundations. Softening ground can lead to collapses, landslides and avalanches, and the houses here are no match for them.

On Dec. 19, 2015, an avalanche killed a man and a child in their homes.

"It was the middle of the night, and nobody knew what was coming," Longyearbyen resident Anna Boegh says near the site where the houses once stood.

"This was thought to be an incredibly uncommon event, but two years after, in 2017, there was another avalanche, says her partner, Erik Holmund.

No one died in that avalanche, but several houses were swept away.

. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay
Huebner plays with her dog Svea.

Erosion also threatens homes here. Three years ago, as winter approached, 13 meters of coastline fell away overnight, leaving Christiane Huebner's cabin perilously close to the fjord. Huebner, her family of three and their husky dogs abandoned the home.

"It was a wake-up call since it happened very quickly," she says. They returned the following spring and had to relocate the cabin 80 meters from the shore.

. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay
. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay

Left: Vicar Ivar Smedsroed consoles Wieslaw Sawicki after a mass.
Right: Wieslaw Sawicki holds a photograph of his son Michal Sawicki.

The ground beneath Svalbard has proven deadly elsewhere. Wieslaw Sawicki's son Michal worked as a geophysicist at the Polish Polar Research Station in Hornsund on the southern side of Svalbard. The Polish scientist and meteorologist Anna Górska died when they fell from a mountain in May.

Michal, 44, was an experienced mountaineer, scientist and explorer on his fifth stint for the institute in the Arctic. Founded in 1957, it conducts year-round research and is the northernmost permanent Polish scientific institution.

"Unfortunately, there was a huge snow cornice which looked like it was part of the peak of the mountain," says Sawicki, who was visiting Longyearbyen last month to meet with the governor of the archipelago. "It collapsed with them; they both fell into the abyss."

He talks about how Michal would send letters home to Poland describing the beauty of Svalbard.

"He would interestingly describe the changes that were happening here, how the glaciers were melting, how during each stay you could see the temperature rising and how the natural environment was changing," he adds, holding back tears.

. Svalbard, Norway. Reuters/Hannah McKay
Salte prepares his huskies for sledding.

The spectre of climate change looms large over Audun Salte's dog farm. The Norwegian owns Svalbard Husky with his wife, Mia.

When the dogs in the yard see Salte, they excitedly jump up, hoping to go out for a run. During the summer, with no snow on the ground, the dogs pull sleds along the bumpy gravel road on wheels, rattling past the few cars on the island.

Salte worries that as temperatures warm, climate change could lead to the extinction of all life on Earth. A man who likes kissing and dancing with his dogs – he has 110 of them – he's concerned most about the nonhumans on the planet.

"If climate change should be the end of humanity, I really don't care, but if climate change is the end of any animal species who hasn't contributed anything towards the speeding up of this process, that's why I am reacting," he says.

Gesturing with a nod toward his dogs, he says: "It's just unfair to anyone that doesn't have a say in what is happening – the dogs, seals or polar bears or birds in the sky. That's why it is unfair, and that is why we should do something."

He compares climate change to an accident that we can't help staring at, feeling lucky we weren't the victim:

"On the highway, when people slow down to look at a car crash, climate change is like that because everyone is slowing down to look at the accident but not realizing that we are actually the car crash."
Audun Salte

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