From 12 to 27 April 2010 I was in Svalbard to work on the sea ice in Ny Ålesund, a research station/town on the west coast of Spitsbergen. With about 35 residents, Ny Ålesund is the third largest town in Svalbard, a group of islands about half way between mainland Norway and the North Pole, after the administrative center Longyearbyen (about 2000 people) and the Russian mining town Barentsburg (about 500 people). All of the residents in Ny Ålesund, most of whom are there on two-year contracts, work either for one of the many research stations run by different nations or for Kings Bay, the Norwegian state-owned company that owns and runs the town.

The map below shows where Svalbard and Ny Ålesund are. Svalbard is the name of the group of islands; Spitsbergen is the name of the largest island, which is also the only island with any towns. Below the map are links to some photo galleries from the trip.