Kolbeinsey (; also known as Kolbeinn's Isle, Seagull Rock, Mevenklint, Mevenklip, or Meeuw Steen) is a small

islet An islet is a very small, often unnamed island. Most definitions are not precise, but some suggest that an islet has little or no vegetation and cannot support human habitation. It may be made of rock, sand and/or hard coral; may be permanen ...

in the

Greenland Sea The Greenland Sea is a body of water that borders Greenland to the west, the Svalbard archipelago to the east, Fram Strait and the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Norwegian Sea and Iceland to the south. The Greenland Sea is often defined a ...

located off the northern coast of

Iceland Iceland ( is, Ísland; ) is a Nordic island country in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the Arctic Ocean. Iceland is the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Iceland's capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which (along with its ...

, north-northwest of the island of

Grímsey Grímsey () is a small Icelandic island, off the north coast of the main island of Iceland, straddling the Arctic Circle. In January 2018 Grímsey had 61 inhabitants. Before 2009, Grimsey constituted the ''hreppur'' (municipality) of Grí ...

. It is the northernmost point of

and lies north of the

Arctic Circle The Arctic Circle is one of the two polar circles, and the most northerly of the five major circles of latitude as shown on maps of Earth. Its southern equivalent is the Antarctic Circle. The Arctic Circle marks the southernmost latitude at ...

. The islet is named after Kolbeinn Sigmundsson, from Kolbeinsdalur in Skagafjörður, who according to '' Svarfdæla saga'' is said to have broken his ship there and died with his men. A

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the surface of a rocky planet or moon. More than 90 ...

landform and devoid of

vegetation Vegetation is an assemblage of plant species and the ground cover they provide. It is a general term, without specific reference to particular taxa, life forms, structure, spatial extent, or any other specific botanical or geographic charac ...

, Kolbeinsey is subject to rapid wave

erosion Erosion is the action of surface processes (such as water flow or wind) that removes soil, rock, or dissolved material from one location on the Earth's crust, and then transports it to another location where it is deposited. Erosion is d ...

and is expected to disappear in the near future. Erosion rate data from 1994 suggested that this would happen around 2020. , two small skerries remained visible at

low tide Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the combined effects of the gravitational forces exerted by the Moon (and to a much lesser extent, the Sun) and are also caused by the Earth and Moon orbiting one another. Tide tables c ...

History

The original size of Kolbeinsey is unknown. When it was first measured in 1616, the island was in length from north to south and east to west. By 1903, it had already diminished to half of that size. In August 1985, the island was recorded as being across. At the beginning of 2001, Kolbeinsey had been reduced to an area of , corresponding to the size of a circle of about in diameter. The island had a maximum elevation of . In 1952, Iceland declared Kolbeinsey to be a baseline point for the purposes of defining its exclusive

fishery Fishery can mean either the enterprise of raising or harvesting fish and other aquatic life; or more commonly, the site where such enterprise takes place ( a.k.a. fishing ground). Commercial fisheries include wild fisheries and fish farms, ...

limits, originally set at from the baseline. Iceland would eventually declare a exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in 1975. At that point,

Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of Denmark , establish ...

(on behalf of

Greenland Greenland ( kl, Kalaallit Nunaat, ; da, Grønland, ) is an island country in North America that is part of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is located between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Greenland ...

) objected to the use of Kolbeinsey as a baseline point as doing so gave Iceland control over of sea area that would otherwise belong to Greenland. A helipad was constructed in 1989 and further efforts to reinforce the island were discussed in the

Icelandic parliament The Alþingi (''general meeting'' in Icelandic, , anglicised as ' or ') is the supreme national parliament of Iceland. It is one of the oldest surviving parliaments in the world. The Althing was founded in 930 at ("thing fields" or "assembly ...

in the 1990s. However, an agreement was reached in 1997 between Iceland, Denmark and Greenland (which was a party to the agreement in its own capacity) that permanently fixed the EEZ boundary in the area, giving Iceland control over 30 percent of the disputed area, while Greenland would control the remaining 70 percent. Since that agreement, Kolbeinsey has not been relevant to the definition of EEZ boundaries and there were no further efforts to reinforce the island. In March 2006, it was reported that helicopters were no longer able to land on Kolbeinsey. It had been found that almost a half of the helipad that was laid with concrete in 1989 had been destroyed when a large piece of rock separated from the rest of the island. In 2010, it was reported that the helipad had collapsed completely and that the island was now actually two skerries, separated by a gap of about . In August 2020, English YouTuber Tom Scott published a video confirming the continued existence of the island, with two skerries still visible at low tide. In April 2021, the Icelandic Coast Guard visited the island and measured it as 20 meters wide from west to east and 14.5 meters long from north to south.

Geology

submarine eruption Submarine eruptions are those volcano eruptions which take place beneath the surface of water. These occur at constructive margins, subduction zones and within tectonic plates due to hotspots. This eruption style is far more prevalent than subae ...

was reported in 1999 near the

Kolbeinsey Ridge The Kolbeinsey Ridge is a segment of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge located to the north of Iceland in the Arctic Ocean. It is bounded to the south by the Tjörnes Fracture Zone, which connects the submarine ridge to the on-shore Northern Volcanic Zone ri ...

northwest of

. Kolbeinsey is the only subaerial expression of this portion of the

Mid-Atlantic Ridge The Mid-Atlantic Ridge is a mid-ocean ridge (a divergent or constructive plate boundary) located along the floor of the Atlantic Ocean, and part of the longest mountain range in the world. In the North Atlantic, the ridge separates the North A ...

. It formed during the late-

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological Epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fina ...

Holocene The Holocene ( ) is the current geological epoch. It began approximately 11,650 cal years Before Present (), after the Last Glacial Period, which concluded with the Holocene glacial retreat. The Holocene and the preceding Pleistocene togeth ...

. Dredged glass shards indicate submarine eruptive activity during the late-Pleistocene until at least 11,800 radiocarbon years ago.

References

External links

Further information on Kolbeinsey

Kolbeinsey að hverfa
in Icelandic {{Authority control Volcanoes of Iceland Uninhabited islands of Iceland Mid-Atlantic Ridge Territorial disputes of Iceland Islands of Iceland

History

Geology

See also

References

External links