Kaffeklubben Island

Kaffeklubben Island or Coffee Club Island (; ) is an uninhabited island lying off the northern shore of Greenland. It contains the undisputed northernmost point of land on Earth.

History

Kaffeklubben Island does not appear to have ever been inhabited. The northern part of Peary Landknown as ''Johannes J. Jensen Land'' was at least visited by members of the Thule peoples, based on archaeological evidence found in 2023 near Bliss Bay, approximately south. The nearest ruins from the older Independence I culture are located at Cape Bridgman, some to the southeast.

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 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 farther north than Cape Morris Jesup, the northernmost point of mainland Greenland, thus claiming its record as the most northerly point of land.

In 2023, an American and Greenlandic team led by Brian Buma and sponsored by National Geographic visited to study the flora and fauna, and establish the northernmost terrestrial ecosystem study in the world. They also discovered the world's northernmost Indigenous site (archaeological) on the mainland near the island.

Other claimants for northernmost land

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 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 the northernmost true land in the world.

Geography and geology

Kaffeklubben Island is from the geographic North Pole. The island lies off Cape James Hill, northwest of Bliss Bay, approximately 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 is approximately long, and approximately across at its widest point. The highest point is approximately above sea level.

A 2022 visit to the island by a Swiss-Danish expedition confirmed the north tip of "Inuit Qeqertaat" (Kaffeklubben Island) at latitude 83°39 054″ N, 30°37 045 ″ W to be the northernmost island in the world.

Flora and fauna

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 National Geographic 2023 expedition determined that the northernmost life was a species of Tortula moss (''Tortula mucronifolia'') and an Arctic poppy (''Papaver radicatum'').

See also

* List of islands of Greenland
* List of northernmost items

References

{{reflist
* https://doi.org/10.1017/S0032247425000051

Extreme points of Earth
Islands of the Arctic Ocean
Uninhabited islands of Greenland