By Webjørn Landmark
As long as there has been fishing and trapping along our coast, it has been men who have been the focus and have been the ones who have carried out this fishing, and later the Arctic sea trapping. There were many shipwrecks, and many men did not return to their loved ones. The history of Norwegian seal hunting is full of dramatic accounts of shipwrecks in the fight against drift ice. Much has been written about this history.
On a trial hunt for Crabeater seals in the Weddell Sea with m/s "Polarhav" in 1964
By skipper Sigmund Bøe
We had made our annual seal hunt to the Newfoundland field with very good results. We had a helicopter on this trip, and it was a great help during the hunt. Our shipowners, Rieber and Karlsen, had been working for some time on plans for a trial trip to Antarctica to investigate whether it was possible to conduct seal hunting there on a profitable basis. Now they took this up again in earnest, but they met with little cooperation from the various authorities.
Interdisciplinary collaboration solved the mystery of the wreck in Iceland. It was the Arctic ship "Brattind" from Tromsø, found by "Videy".
– The fact that the wreck of one of the 1952 ships has now been found is, in short, a sensation, says Webjørn Landmark, managing director of Ishavsmuseet Aarvak.
Miraculously, two men survive. Eleven others perish in the icy, raging sea.
Written by Johannes Bjarne Alme
At 05:12 on the morning of Monday, February 11, 1974, skipper Oddvar Simonsen on the "Lance II" calls Vardø Radio and says that they have run aground on the way from Vadsø to Båtsfjord, near Makkaur. He asks for nearby vessels to come to the rescue.
On the weekend of October 7-8, the Icelandic trawler "Videy" received parts from a seal hunting vessel in its trawl.
The following day, Ishavsmuseet Aarvak received a phone call and email from Iceland regarding the discovery of the trawler "Videy".
The crew of the "Isrypen" ate "paraffin bread" and drank "paraffin coffee" throughout the Strede voyage in 1915.
Harald Vartdal tells about a couple of Arctic ocean trips he made with the Brandal ship "Isrypen" to the West Ice and the Danish Strait in 1914 and 1915.
About, among other things, aerial photography and mapping of Queen Maud Land: An operation that was not secret, but which was still preferable not to be talked about.
By Magnus Sefland
Lars O. Brandal, who was born in 1862, tells Peter Karlsen
Fishing with Otters. The first year I fished was in 1878. I was then with my father, Olavius Larsen Brandal's otter. Such an otter was about 27 cubits long. (from 21 – 27) But the boat measures were counted as 21, and they had three masts.
The date of the sinking was Sunday, March 23, 1952.
At that time I was an engineer on “Sjannøy”. “Vestis” and “Sjannøy” were in a way companion ships. It was common at that time for a pair of ships to keep company. Such a team was often practical, the skippers could consult on matters and things.
The Easter hurricane in the Vesterisen in 1952, where 79 men escaped, is one of the dark memories the Arctic shipping industry carries with it. Coincidence, combined with the knowledge of the skippers, meant that the disaster was not a bigger one.
By Johannes Bjarne Alme
By Arctic sea captain Sigmund Bøe
Some time ago, you could read in the newspapers and hear on the radio about the freighter "Remito", which was drifting ashore in the area near Kvitneset in Stadt. The reason was that the power supply failed, and they only had electric steering, so even though the engine was running, they still ended up in the shallows, and the boat was completely sunk.
It was 1927 and we left Ålesund with the "Furenak" on February 16. North along the coast we had pretty bad weather and when we got to Vardø the frost smoke lay thick as a curtain in the fjord. But we continued east and when we came in towards the ice in Kvitesjøen we got a northwesterly storm. Inland it was still open (ice-free) so we got in to Cape Orlov, and in a nice bay we anchored for the night.
Left Brandal on Monday, March 14. – Left Harøysundet on Tuesday morning at 7 am. – Course NtV – SW gale the first day, then easterly gale which decreased to a breeze. – Kept company with “Polaric” and “Fangstmand”. – Got ice on Saturday morning. Kept going and went in through the ice, which was very rough.
by Arctic sea captain Vebjørn Landmark
After many days of hauling and staking through the pack ice, "Sleipner" and "Norrøna" finally lay still and drifted in loose ice off East Greenland.
Narrated by Sverre Døving:
On February 25, 1925 at 5 in the morning, we traveled with the Arctic ship “Ris” from Brandal with a full crew of 14 men on a trip to the White Sea.
In those days there was no question of doing anything else but traveling on the Arctic Ocean. So I went aboard the ice/s "Admiralen" and spoke to Kristoffer Marø who was still the skipper on board. I got a place right away.
By Webjørn Landmark
On at least eight occasions, "Aarvak" has lost or damaged its propeller, necessitating replacement in the ice.
Note by skipper Benjamin Brandal.
1917 was the year of great misfortune for the Arctic ships in the Vesterisen. When the ships were about to get ready, the shipowner, Sigvald Brandal, came and said: There is such a problem with coal that I can only get one load of coal for each ship. You can choose whether you want to go to the Vesterisen or the Danish Strait!
By Webjørn Landmark
"Anyone who has had the experience of observing musk oxen at a fairly close range will hardly forget this experience. This ancient, frugal and high-Arctic polar cattle and herd animal, which for tens of thousands of years has lived peacefully on a subsistence minimum in the most remote Arctic regions of our planet, is a fascinating sight that grips every nature lover right into the soul."
By Webjørn Landmark
In the collections of the Ishavsmuseet we find three cannonballs. One large, with a circumference of 44,5 cm and weighing 11 kg, and two that are somewhat smaller.
Reiulf Moltu tells us about his first trip to the Arctic Ocean, and not least about the preparations and the conditions as they were in 1947. He was 19 years old at the time. Times were difficult so soon after the war, there was a shortage of almost everything.
