Ny Ålesund

On the south side of the Kongsfjord lies the former mining settlement of Ny Ålesund (mines closed down in 1962 after a number of accidents). Features of interest in the little town are the Ny Ålesund Railway (steam engine of 1909), a monument to the mining history of Spitzbergen; the world's most northerly post office (special postmark); and the airship mooring mast from which Roald Amundsen set out in the airship "Norge" in 1926 to fly over the North Pole (monument commemorating the flight). Two years later Umberto Nobile also set out from here in an airship but was wrecked on the return flight, and Amundsen was lost in the course of a rescue mission.