90°N 0°E / 90°N 0°E / 90; 0
69-596: The Open Polar Sea was a conjectured ice-free body of water that was believed to encircle the North Pole . Although this theory was widely accepted and served as a basis for many exploratory expeditions aimed at reaching the North Pole by sea or discovering a navigable route between Europe and the Pacific via the North Pole, it was ultimately proven to be untrue. However, global warming could open large areas of
138-485: A Russian scientific expedition Arktika 2007 made the first ever manned descent to the ocean floor at the North Pole, to a depth of 4.3 km (2.7 mi), as part of the research programme in support of Russia's 2001 extended continental shelf claim to a large swathe of the Arctic Ocean floor. The descent took place in two MIR submersibles and was led by Soviet and Russian polar explorer Artur Chilingarov . In
207-508: A flight from Chicago to Beijing may come close as latitude 89° N, though because of prevailing winds return journeys go over the Bering Strait . In recent years journeys to the North Pole by air (landing by helicopter or on a runway prepared on the ice) or by icebreaker have become relatively routine, and are even available to small groups of tourists through adventure holiday companies. Parachute jumps have frequently been made onto
276-479: A journey to the Pole and back while traveling along the direct line – the only strategy that is consistent with the time constraints that he was facing – is contradicted by Henson's account of tortuous detours to avoid pressure ridges and open leads . The British explorer Wally Herbert , initially a supporter of Peary, researched Peary's records in 1989 and found that there were significant discrepancies in
345-513: A modified Douglas C-47 Skytrain at the North Pole. Some Western sources considered this to be the first landing at the Pole until the Soviet landings became widely known. The United States Navy submarine USS Nautilus (SSN-571) crossed the North Pole on 3 August 1958. On 17 March 1959 USS Skate (SSN-578) surfaced at the Pole, breaking through the ice above it, becoming the first naval vessel to do so. The first confirmed surface conquest of
414-462: A party over the ice and reached latitude 86° 34’ on 25 April, setting a new record by beating Nansen's result of 1895 by 35 to 40 km (22 to 25 mi). Cagni barely managed to return to the camp, remaining there until 23 June. On 16 August, the Stella Polare left Rudolf Island heading south and the expedition returned to Norway. The US explorer Frederick Cook claimed to have reached
483-549: A permanent station at the North Pole ( unlike the South Pole ). However, the Soviet Union , and later Russia, constructed a number of manned drifting stations on a generally annual basis since 1937, some of which have passed over or very close to the Pole. Since 2002, a group of Russians have also annually established a private base, Barneo , close to the Pole. This operates for a few weeks during early spring. Studies in
552-472: A result of this journey, which formed a section of the three-year Transglobe Expedition 1979–1982, Fiennes and Burton became the first people to complete a circumnavigation of the world via both North and South Poles, by surface travel alone. This achievement remains unchallenged to this day. The expedition crew included a Jack Russell Terrier named Bothie who became the first dog to visit both poles. In 1985 Sir Edmund Hillary (the first man to stand on
621-600: A sea of ice. After a long drift, pack ice crushed the Jeannette , and her survivors returned home with first hand accounts of an ice-covered polar sea. Other explorers such as British explorer George Nares confirmed it. When Fridtjof Nansen and Otto Sverdrup drifted through the polar ice pack in Fram in 1893 to 1895, the Open Polar Sea was a defunct theory. Nevertheless, scientific studies of global warming in
690-400: A ship broke through the regions of thick ice that had stopped previous explorers, a temperate sea would be found beyond it. Although it is now known that the North Pole was covered with thick ice for much of the period, the Open Polar Sea was a popular theory in the 16th to the 19th centuries, and many arguments were made to justify its existence: The Open Polar Sea was debunked gradually by
759-701: A symbolic act of visitation, the Russian flag was placed on the ocean floor exactly at the Pole. The expedition was the latest in a series of efforts intended to give Russia a dominant influence in the Arctic according to The New York Times . In 2009 the Russian Marine Live-Ice Automobile Expedition (MLAE-2009) with Vasily Elagin as a leader and a team of Afanasy Makovnev, Vladimir Obikhod, Alexey Shkrabkin, Sergey Larin, Alexey Ushakov and Nikolay Nikulshin reached
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#1732764875828828-530: A wandering of the Pole across the Earth's surface, by a range of a few metres. The wandering has several periodic components and an irregular component. The component with a period of about 435 days is identified with the eight-month wandering predicted by Euler and is now called the Chandler wobble after its discoverer. The exact point of intersection of the Earth's axis and the Earth's surface, at any given moment,
897-496: Is approximately 700 metres (2,300 ft) long, and approximately 300 metres (980 ft) across at its widest point. The highest point is approximately 30 metres (98 ft) above sea level. Despite the harsh environment, vegetation grows on Kaffeklubben island, including various mosses , liverworts , lichens , and the flowering plants : Saxifraga oppositifolia (purple saxifrage) and Papaver radicatum (arctic poppy). The aforementioned 2023 expedition determined that
966-423: Is called the "instantaneous pole", but because of the "wobble" this cannot be used as a definition of a fixed North Pole (or South Pole) when metre-scale precision is required. It is desirable to tie the system of Earth coordinates (latitude, longitude, and elevations or orography ) to fixed landforms. However, given plate tectonics and isostasy , there is no system in which all geographic features are fixed. Yet
1035-416: Is debate as to whether such gravel banks should be considered for the record since they rarely are permanent, being swallowed regularly by the moving ice sheets, being shifted in tides, or becoming submerged in the ocean. A bathymetric survey in 2022 determined that all gravel banks north of Kaffeklubben are likely not connected to the seafloor, but rather gravel on top of the sea ice, confirming Kaffeklubben as
1104-498: Is east and clockwise is west. The North Pole is at the center of the Northern Hemisphere. The nearest land is usually said to be Kaffeklubben Island , off the northern coast of Greenland about 700 km (430 mi) away, though some perhaps semi-permanent gravel banks lie slightly closer. The nearest permanently inhabited place is Alert on Ellesmere Island , Canada, which is located 817 km (508 mi) from
1173-641: The Geological Survey of Canada and the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research . Further stops for sample collections were on multi-year sea ice at 86°N, at Cape Columbia and Ward Hunt Island . On 4 May 1990 Børge Ousland and Erling Kagge became the first explorers ever to reach the North Pole unsupported, after a 58-day ski trek from Ellesmere Island in Canada, a distance of 800 km. On 7 September 1991
1242-783: The International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service and the International Astronomical Union have defined a framework called the International Terrestrial Reference System . As early as the 16th century, many prominent people correctly believed that the North Pole was in a sea, which in the 19th century was called the Polynya or Open Polar Sea . It was therefore hoped that passage could be found through ice floes at favorable times of
1311-587: The airship Norge . Norge , though Norwegian-owned, was designed and piloted by the Italian Umberto Nobile . The flight started from Svalbard in Norway, and crossed the Arctic Ocean to Alaska. Nobile, with several scientists and crew from the Norge , overflew the Pole a second time on 24 May 1928, in the airship Italia . The Italia crashed on its return from the Pole, with the loss of half
1380-427: The 2000s predicted that the North Pole may become seasonally ice-free because of Arctic ice shrinkage , with timescales varying from 2016 to the late 21st century or later. Attempts to reach the North Pole began in the late 19th century, with the record for " Farthest North " being surpassed on numerous occasions. The first undisputed expedition to reach the North Pole was that of the airship Norge , which overflew
1449-403: The 2000s project that by the end of the 21st century, the annual summer withdrawal of the polar ice cap could expose large areas of the Arctic Ocean as open water, and an ice-free Arctic is possible in the future because of Arctic shrinkage . Although the North Pole itself could potentially remain ice-covered in winter, a navigable seasonal sea passage from Europe to the Pacific could develop along
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#17327648758281518-473: The Arctic Ocean by the end of the 21st century. The theory that the North Pole region might be a practical sea route goes back to at least the 16th century, when it was suggested by English cartographer Robert Thorne (1492-1532). The explorers William Barents and Henry Hudson also believed in the Open Polar Sea. For a time, the theory was put aside because of the practical experience of navigators who encountered impenetrable ice as they went north. However,
1587-473: The Arctic Ocean under the polar ice cap from September to November 1984 in company with one of her sister ships, the attack submarine USS Pintado (SSN-672) . On 12 November 1984 Gurnard and Pintado became the third pair of submarines to surface together at the North Pole. In March 1990, Gurnard deployed to the Arctic region during exercise Ice Ex '90 and completed only the fourth winter submerged transit of
1656-639: The Bering and Seas. Gurnard surfaced at the North Pole on 18 April, in the company of the USS Seahorse (SSN-669) . On 6 May 1986 USS Archerfish (SSN 678) , USS Ray (SSN 653) and USS Hawkbill (SSN-666) surfaced at the North Pole, the first tri-submarine surfacing at the North Pole. On 21 April 1987 Shinji Kazama of Japan became the first person to reach the North Pole on a motorcycle . On 18 May 1987 USS Billfish (SSN 676) , USS Sea Devil (SSN 664) and HMS Superb (S 109) surfaced at
1725-473: The Earth, lying antipodally to the South Pole . It defines geodetic latitude 90° North, as well as the direction of true north . At the North Pole all directions point south; all lines of longitude converge there, so its longitude can be defined as any degree value. No time zone has been assigned to the North Pole, so any time can be used as the local time. Along tight latitude circles, counterclockwise
1794-663: The Geographical North Pole. On 1 March 2013 the Russian Marine Live-Ice Automobile Expedition (MLAE 2013) with Vasily Elagin as a leader, and a team of Afanasy Makovnev, Vladimir Obikhod, Alexey Shkrabkin, Andrey Vankov, Sergey Isayev and Nikolay Kozlov on two custom-built 6 x 6 low-pressure-tire ATVs—Yemelya-3 and Yemelya-4—started from Golomyanny Island (the Severnaya Zemlya Archipelago) to
1863-684: The German research vessel Polarstern and the Swedish icebreaker Oden reached the North Pole as the first conventional powered vessels. Both scientific parties and crew took oceanographic and geological samples and had a common tug of war and a football game on an ice floe. Polarstern again reached the pole exactly 10 years later, with the Healy . In 1998, 1999, and 2000, Lada Niva Marshs (special very large wheeled versions made by BRONTO, Lada/Vaz's experimental product division) were driven to
1932-721: The North Pole across drifting ice of the Arctic Ocean. The vehicles reached the Pole on 6 April and then continued to the Canadian coast. The coast was reached on 30 April 2013 (83°08N, 075°59W Ward Hunt Island ), and on 5 May 2013 the expedition finished in Resolute Bay , NU. The way between the Russian borderland (Machtovyi Island of the Severnaya Zemlya Archipelago, 80°15N, 097°27E) and the Canadian coast (Ward Hunt Island, 83°08N, 075°59W) took 55 days; it
2001-476: The North Pole after the ever first landing of four heavy and one light aircraft onto the ice at the North Pole. The expedition members — oceanographer Pyotr Shirshov , meteorologist Yevgeny Fyodorov , radio operator Ernst Krenkel , and the leader Ivan Papanin — conducted scientific research at the station for the next nine months. By 19 February 1938, when the group was picked up by the ice breakers Taimyr and Murman , their station had drifted 2850 km to
2070-422: The North Pole and spent 18 hours there. In July 2007 British endurance swimmer Lewis Gordon Pugh completed a 1 km (0.62 mi) swim at the North Pole. His feat, undertaken to highlight the effects of global warming , took place in clear water that had opened up between the ice floes. His later attempt to paddle a kayak to the North Pole in late 2008, following the erroneous prediction of clear water to
2139-452: The North Pole in recent years. The temporary seasonal Russian camp of Barneo has been established by air a short distance from the Pole annually since 2002, and caters for scientific researchers as well as tourist parties. Trips from the camp to the Pole itself may be arranged overland or by helicopter. The first attempt at underwater exploration of the North Pole was made on 22 April 1998 by Russian firefighter and diver Andrei Rozhkov with
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2208-501: The North Pole on 21 April 1908 with two Inuit men, Ahwelah and Etukishook, but he was unable to produce convincing proof and his claim is not widely accepted. The conquest of the North Pole was for many years credited to US Navy engineer Robert Peary , who claimed to have reached the Pole on 6 April 1909, accompanied by Matthew Henson and four Inuit men, Ootah, Seeglo, Egingwah, and Ooqueah. However, Peary's claim remains highly disputed and controversial. Those who accompanied Peary on
2277-485: The North Pole on foot (albeit with the aid of dog teams and airdrops ). They continued on to complete the first surface crossing of the Arctic Ocean ;– and by its longest axis, Barrow, Alaska , to Svalbard – a feat that has never been repeated. Because of suggestions (later proven false) of Plaisted's use of air transport, some sources classify Herbert's expedition as the first confirmed to reach
2346-453: The North Pole on the ground was in 1948 by a 24-man Soviet party, part of Aleksandr Kuznetsov 's Sever-2 expedition to the Arctic, who flew part-way to the Pole first before making the final trek to the Pole on foot. The first complete land expedition to reach the North Pole was in 1968 by Ralph Plaisted , Walt Pederson, Gerry Pitzl and Jean-Luc Bombardier, using snowmobiles and with air support. The Earth's axis of rotation – and hence
2415-408: The North Pole on two custom-built 6 x 6 low-pressure-tire ATVs. The vehicles, Yemelya-1 and Yemelya-2, were designed by Vasily Elagin, a Russian mountain climber, explorer and engineer. They reached the North Pole on 26 April 2009, 17:30 (Moscow time). The expedition was partly supported by Russian State Aviation. The Russian Book of Records recognized it as the first successful vehicle trip from land to
2484-457: The North Pole over the ice surface by any means. In the 1980s Plaisted's pilots Weldy Phipps and Ken Lee signed affidavits asserting that no such airlift was provided. It is also said that Herbert was the first person to reach the pole of inaccessibility . On 17 August 1977 the Soviet nuclear-powered icebreaker Arktika completed the first surface vessel journey to the North Pole. In 1982 Ranulph Fiennes and Charles R. Burton became
2553-494: The North Pole was accomplished by Ralph Plaisted , Walt Pederson, Gerry Pitzl and Jean Luc Bombardier, who traveled over the ice by snowmobile and arrived on 19 April 1968. The United States Air Force independently confirmed their position. On 6 April 1969 Wally Herbert and companions Allan Gill, Roy Koerner and Kenneth Hedges of the British Trans-Arctic Expedition became the first men to reach
2622-709: The North Pole, the first international surfacing at the North Pole. In 1988 a team of 13 (9 Soviets, 4 Canadians) skied across the arctic from Siberia to northern Canada. One of the Canadians, Richard Weber , became the first person to reach the Pole from both sides of the Arctic Ocean. On April 16, 1990, a German-Swiss expedition led by a team of the University of Giessen reached the Geographic North Pole for studies on pollution of pack ice , snow and air. Samples taken were analyzed in cooperation with
2691-404: The North Pole. The 1998 expedition was dropped by parachute and completed the track to the North Pole. The 2000 expedition departed from a Russian research base around 114 km from the Pole and claimed an average speed of 20–15 km/h in an average temperature of −30 °C. Commercial airliner flights on the polar routes may pass within viewing distance of the North Pole. For example,
2760-797: The North Pole." The first claimed flight over the Pole was made on 9 May 1926 by US naval officer Richard E. Byrd and pilot Floyd Bennett in a Fokker tri-motor aircraft. Although verified at the time by a committee of the National Geographic Society , this claim has since been undermined by the 1996 revelation that Byrd's long-hidden diary's solar sextant data (which the NGS never checked) consistently contradict his June 1926 report's parallel data by over 100 mi (160 km). The secret report's alleged en-route solar sextant data were inadvertently so impossibly overprecise that he excised all these alleged raw solar observations out of
2829-403: The Pole on skis after leaving Nansen's icebound ship Fram . The pair reached latitude 86°14′ North before they abandoned the attempt and turned southwards, eventually reaching Franz Josef Land . In 1897, Swedish engineer Salomon August Andrée and two companions tried to reach the North Pole in the hydrogen balloon Örnen ("Eagle"), but came down 300 km (190 mi) north of Kvitøya ,
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2898-471: The Pole, was stymied when his expedition found itself stuck in thick ice after only three days. The expedition was then abandoned. By September 2007 the North Pole had been visited 66 times by different surface ships: 54 times by Soviet and Russian icebreakers, 4 times by Swedish Oden , 3 times by German Polarstern , 3 times by USCGC Healy and USCGC Polar Sea , and once by CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent and by Swedish Vidar Viking . On 2 August 2007
2967-569: The Pole. While the South Pole lies on a continental land mass , the North Pole is located in the middle of the Arctic Ocean amid waters that are almost permanently covered with constantly shifting sea ice . The sea depth at the North Pole has been measured at 4,261 m (13,980 ft) by the Russian Mir submersible in 2007 and at 4,087 m (13,409 ft) by USS Nautilus in 1958. This makes it impractical to construct
3036-416: The area in 1926 with 16 men on board, including expedition leader Roald Amundsen . Three prior expeditions – led by Frederick Cook (1908, land), Robert Peary (1909, land) and Richard E. Byrd (1926, aerial) – were once also accepted as having reached the Pole. However, in each case later analysis of expedition data has cast doubt upon the accuracy of their claims. The first verified individuals to reach
3105-401: The continent. Next year, on 9 May 1949 two other Soviet scientists (Vitali Volovich and Andrei Medvedev) became the first people to parachute onto the North Pole. They jumped from a Douglas C-47 Skytrain , registered CCCP H-369. On 3 May 1952, U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Joseph O. Fletcher and Lieutenant William Pershing Benedict , along with scientist Albert P. Crary , landed
3174-565: The crew. Another transpolar flight [ ru ] was accomplished in a Tupolev ANT-25 airplane with a crew of Valery Chkalov , Georgy Baydukov and Alexander Belyakov , who flew over the North Pole on 19 June 1937, during their direct flight from the Soviet Union to the USA without any stopover. In May 1937 the world's first North Pole ice station , North Pole-1 , was established by Soviet scientists 20 kilometres (13 mi) from
3243-478: The culture disappeared after around 1900 BC, and the northern part of Peary Land – known as Johannes J. Jensen Land – has remained uninhabited ever since. The first recorded sighting of Kaffeklubben Island was made by the American explorer Robert Peary in 1900, who believed that Cape Morris Jesup on the mainland was the world's northernmost point of land and who declined to name
3312-667: The eastern coast of Greenland. In May 1945 an RAF Lancaster of the Aries expedition became the first Commonwealth aircraft to overfly the North Geographic and North Magnetic Poles. The plane was piloted by David Cecil McKinley of the Royal Air Force . It carried an 11-man crew, with Kenneth C. Maclure of the Royal Canadian Air Force in charge of all scientific observations. In 2006, Maclure
3381-422: The explorer's navigational records. He concluded that Peary had not reached the Pole. Support for Peary came again in 2005, however, when British explorer Tom Avery and four companions recreated the outward portion of Peary's journey with replica wooden sleds and Canadian Eskimo Dog teams, reaching the North Pole in 36 days, 22 hours – nearly five hours faster than Peary. However, Avery's fastest 5-day march
3450-402: The failure of the expeditions in the 1810s to the 1880s to navigate the polar sea. Reports of open water by earlier explorers, such as Elisha Kent Kane and Isaac Israel Hayes , fueled optimism in the theory in the 1850s and 1860s. Support faded when George W. De Long sailed USS Jeannette into the Bering Strait in the hope of finding an open gateway to the North Pole and was met by
3519-426: The final stage of the journey were not trained in navigation, and thus could not independently confirm his navigational work, which some claim to have been particularly sloppy as he approached the Pole. The distances and speeds that Peary claimed to have achieved once the last support party turned back seem incredible to many people, almost three times that which he had accomplished up to that point. Peary's account of
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#17327648758283588-608: The first people to cross the Arctic Ocean in a single season. They departed from Cape Crozier, Ellesmere Island , on 17 February 1982 and arrived at the geographic North Pole on 10 April 1982. They travelled on foot and snowmobile. From the Pole, they travelled towards Svalbard but, due to the unstable nature of the ice, ended their crossing at the ice edge after drifting south on an ice floe for 99 days. They were eventually able to walk to their expedition ship MV Benjamin Bowring and boarded it on 4 August 1982 at position 80:31N 00:59W. As
3657-416: The idea was revived again in the mid-19th century by theoretical geographers, such as Matthew F. Maury and August Petermann . At the time, interest in polar exploration was high because of the search for John Franklin 's missing expedition, and many would-be polar explorers took up the theory, including Elisha Kent Kane , Dr. Isaac Israel Hayes , and George Washington De Long . It was believed that once
3726-476: The island. The island itself was not visited until 1921, when the Danish explorer Lauge Koch set foot on the island and named it after the coffee club in the University of Copenhagen Geological Museum . In 1969, a Canadian team calculated that the island's northernmost tip is 750 metres (2,460 ft) farther north than Cape Morris Jesup , the northernmost point of mainland Greenland, thus claiming its record as
3795-400: The most northerly point of land. In 2023, an American and Greenlandic team visited to study the flora and fauna, and establish the northernmost terrestrial ecosystem study in the world. Since its record as the northernmost point of land was established, several gravel banks have been discovered in the sea to the north of the island, such as Oodaaq , 83-42 , and ATOW1996 ; however, there
3864-726: The north coast of Asia. North Pole The North Pole , also known as the Geographic North Pole , Terrestrial North Pole or 90th Parallel North , is the point in the Northern Hemisphere where the Earth's axis of rotation meets its surface. It is called the True North Pole to distinguish from the Magnetic North Pole . The North Pole is by definition the northernmost point on
3933-788: The northeasternmost part of the Svalbard archipelago. They trekked to Kvitøya but died there three months after their crash. In 1930 the remains of this expedition were found by the Norwegian Bratvaag Expedition . The Italian explorer Luigi Amedeo, Duke of the Abruzzi and Captain Umberto Cagni of the Italian Royal Navy ( Regia Marina ) sailed the converted whaler Stella Polare ("Pole Star") from Norway in 1899. On 11 March 1900, Cagni led
4002-473: The northern shore of Greenland . It contains the northernmost undisputed point of land on Earth . Kaffeklubben Island does not appear to have ever been inhabited. The nearest ruins from the Independence I culture are located at Cape Bridgman , some 80 km (50 mi) to the southeast. Whether members of this culture, or any culture, ever went to the island or its vicinity is unknown; in any event,
4071-443: The northernmost true land in the world. Kaffeklubben Island is 713.5 kilometres (443.3 mi) from the geographic North Pole . The island lies off Cape James Hill , 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) northwest of Bliss Bay , approximately 37 kilometres (23 mi) east of Cape Morris Jesup , a little east of a central point along the northern coast of Greenland. Its most northerly point is 4.4 km north of that of Cape Morris Jesup. It
4140-703: The pole, part of the British Arctic Expedition , by Commander Albert H. Markham reached a then-record 83°20'26" North in May 1876 before turning back. An 1879–1881 expedition commanded by US naval officer George W. De Long ended tragically when their ship, the USS ; Jeannette , was crushed by ice. Over half the crew, including De Long, were lost. In April 1895, the Norwegian explorers Fridtjof Nansen and Hjalmar Johansen struck out for
4209-560: The position of the North Pole ;– was commonly believed to be fixed (relative to the surface of the Earth) until, in the 18th century, the mathematician Leonhard Euler predicted that the axis might "wobble" slightly. Around the beginning of the 20th century astronomers noticed a small apparent "variation of latitude", as determined for a fixed point on Earth from the observation of stars. Part of this variation could be attributed to
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#17327648758284278-408: The summit of Mount Everest) and Neil Armstrong (the first man to stand on the moon) landed at the North Pole in a small twin-engined ski plane. Hillary thus became the first man to stand at both poles and on the summit of Everest. In 1986 Will Steger , with seven teammates, became the first to be confirmed as reaching the Pole by dogsled and without resupply. USS Gurnard (SSN-662) operated in
4347-551: The support of the Diving Club of Moscow State University , but ended in fatality. The next attempted dive at the North Pole was organized the next year by the same diving club, and ended in success on 24 April 1999. The divers were Michael Wolff (Austria), Brett Cormick (UK), and Bob Wass (USA). In 2005 the United States Navy submarine USS Charlotte (SSN-766) surfaced through 155 cm (61 in) of ice at
4416-427: The version of the report finally sent to geographical societies five months later (while the original version was hidden for 70 years), a realization first published in 2000 by the University of Cambridge after scrupulous refereeing. The first consistent, verified, and scientifically convincing attainment of the Pole was on 12 May 1926, by Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen and his US sponsor Lincoln Ellsworth from
4485-551: The year. Several expeditions set out to find the way, generally with whaling ships, already commonly used in the cold northern latitudes. One of the earliest expeditions to set out with the explicit intention of reaching the North Pole was that of British naval officer William Edward Parry , who in 1827 reached latitude 82°45′ North. In 1871, the Polaris expedition , a US attempt on the Pole led by Charles Francis Hall , ended in disaster. Another British Royal Navy attempt to get to
4554-459: Was 90 nautical miles (170 km), significantly short of the 135 nautical miles (250 km) claimed by Peary. Avery writes on his web site that "The admiration and respect which I hold for Robert Peary, Matthew Henson and the four Inuit men who ventured North in 1909, has grown enormously since we set out from Cape Columbia . Having now seen for myself how he travelled across the pack ice, I am more convinced than ever that Peary did indeed discover
4623-455: Was honoured with a spot in Canada's Aviation Hall of Fame . Discounting Peary's disputed claim, the first men to set foot at the North Pole were a Soviet party including geophysicists Mikhail Ostrekin and Pavel Senko, oceanographers Mikhail Somov and Pavel Gordienko, and other scientists and flight crew (24 people in total) of Aleksandr Kuznetsov 's Sever-2 expedition (March–May 1948). It
4692-547: Was organized by the Chief Directorate of the Northern Sea Route . The party flew on three planes (pilots Ivan Cherevichnyy, Vitaly Maslennikov and Ilya Kotov) from Kotelny Island to the North Pole and landed there at 4:44pm ( Moscow Time , UTC+04:00 ) on 23 April 1948. They established a temporary camp and for the next two days conducted scientific observations. On 26 April the expedition flew back to
4761-481: Was ~2300 km across drifting ice and about 4000 km in total. The expedition was totally self-dependent and used no external supplies. The expedition was supported by the Russian Geographical Society . Kaffeklubben Island Kaffeklubben Island or Coffee Club Island ( Danish : Kaffeklubben Ø ; Greenlandic : Inuit Qeqertaat ) is an uninhabited island lying off
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