Wrangel Island

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Lore & Background

Captain Thomas Long named Wrangel Island after Baron Ferdinand von Wrangel, who was a Baltic German explorer and Admiral in the Imperial Russian Navy. Captain Long, published in The Honolulu Advertiser, November 1867: "I have named this northern land Wrangell Land as an appropriate tribute to the memory of a man who spent three consecutive years north of latitude 68°, and demonstrated the problem of this open polar sea forty-five years ago, although others of much later date have endeavored to claim the merit of this discovery." Baron von Wrangel never managed to visit the island. Wrangel had noticed swarms of birds flying north, and, questioning the native population, determined that there must be an island undiscovered by Europeans existing in the Arctic Ocean. He searched for it during his Kolymskaya expedition (1823–1824), but failed to find it. Wrangel Island is about 150 km (93 mi) long from east to west and 80 km (50 mi) wide from north to south, with an area of 7,600 km2 (2,900 sq mi). It is separated from the Siberian mainland by the De Long Strait. The distance to the closest point on the mainland is 140 km (87 mi). The island's topography consists of a southern coastal plain that is on average 15 km (9.3 mi) wide; a 40 km (25 mi) wide east-west trending central belt of low-relief mountains, with the highest elevations at the Tsentral'nye Mountain Range; and a roughly 25 km (16 mi) wide northern coastal plain. The highest mountain on this island is Gora Sovetskaya with an elevation of 1,096 m (3,596 ft) above mean sea level. Despite its mountainous terrain and high latitude, Wrangel Island is not glaciated. Wrangel Island is a breeding ground for polar bears having the highest density of dens in the world, bearded and ringed seals, walrus, as well as collared and west and east Siberian lemmings are a major food source for terrestrial carnivores, namely the Arctic foxes, wolverines and wolves which also inhabit the island. Woolly mammoths survived on the island until around 2500–2000 BC (4,500–4,000 years ago), the most recent survival of any known mammoth populations; for perspective, these mammoths were living during the times of ancient Bronze Age civilizations, such as Sumer, Elam and the Indus Valley. This was also the time of the fourth dynasty of Ancient Egypt. Mammoths, apparently, died out and subsequently disappeared from mainland Eurasia and North America around 10,000 years ago; however, about 500–1,000 mammoths were isolated on Wrangel Island and thus continued to survive for another 6,000 years. Domestic reindeer were introduced in the 1950s, and their feral numbers are managed at around 1,000. In 1975, musk oxen were also introduced, with a population that has grown from 20 to about 1,000. In 2002, wolves were spotted on the island; wolves had been present on the island in ancient times. The flora of the island includes 417 species of plants, double that of any other Arctic tundra territory, of comparable size, and more than any other Arctic island. Thus, the island was proclaimed the northernmost World Heritage Site in 2004.

Reader's Guide

Wrangel Island holds exceptional significance as a natural sanctuary and a site of paleontological importance. Designated a zapovednik (strict nature reserve) in 1976, it excludes virtually all human activity except conservation research and scientific purposes. The protected marine area was extended to 24 nautical miles offshore in 1999. As of 2003, four rangers reside on the island year-round, with about 12 scientists conducting research during summer. The island is most famous for hosting the last generally accepted surviving population of woolly mammoths, which persisted until around 4,000 years ago—contemporaneous with ancient Bronze Age civilizations such as Sumer, Elam, and the Indus Valley, as well as the fourth dynasty of Ancient Egypt. This represents a survival of 6,000 years beyond the extinction of mainland mammoths. Its inclusion in the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2004 underscores its global value as the northernmost World Heritage Site, with biodiversity unmatched by any other Arctic island. The island's position astride the 180th meridian also makes its north shore both the northeasternmost and northwesternmost point of land by strict longitude, though the International Date Line shifts those designations to Herald Island and Alaska's Cape Lisburne.

Did You Know?

• Wrangel Island is the 92nd-largest island in the world and roughly the size of Crete.
• The island's indigenous Chukot name is Umqiḷir, meaning 'island of polar bears'.
• Woolly mammoths survived on Wrangel Island until around 2500–2000 BC, contemporaneous with the fourth dynasty of Ancient Egypt.
• Baron Ferdinand von Wrangel, after whom the island is named, never visited it; he deduced its existence from bird flocks and native accounts.
• The island has the highest density of polar bear dens in the world.

Straddling the 180th Meridian

Wrangel Island stretches roughly 150 kilometres east to west and 80 kilometres north to south, covering about 7,600 square kilometres — roughly the size of Crete. It sits in the Arctic Ocean between the Chukchi Sea and the East Siberian Sea, separated from the Siberian mainland by the De Long Strait, with the nearest mainland shore 140 kilometres away. The island straddles the 180th meridian, making its north shore at that point simultaneously the northeasternmost and northwesternmost point of land on Earth by strict longitude. To keep the island and the Chukchi Peninsula on the same calendar day as the rest of Russia, the International Date Line is displaced eastward at this latitude. The closest other landmass is the tiny, rocky Herald Island, 60 kilometres to the east. Topographically, the island features a southern coastal plain averaging 15 kilometres wide, a central belt of low-relief mountains about 40 kilometres across, and a northern coastal plain roughly 25 kilometres wide. The highest summit, Gora Sovetskaya, reaches 1,096 metres, though most peaks sit just above 500 metres. Despite its high latitude and mountainous character, the island is entirely free of glaciers.

A Fortress of Protection

Since 1976, Wrangel Island and its surrounding waters have held the status of a zapovednik, Russia's most stringent form of nature reserve, which effectively bars all human activity except conservation research and scientific work. The Chukotka Regional government later broadened the protected marine zone to 44 kilometres offshore in 1999, and in 2004 the island's natural complex earned a place on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Day-to-day stewardship is remarkably small in scale: as of 2003, just four rangers lived on the island year-round, while a rotating team of roughly twelve scientists arrived each summer to carry out fieldwork. The reserve is administered by Russia's Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment. Perhaps the most poignant fact about this protected landscape is that it was the last known refuge of the woolly mammoth, with radiocarbon dating indicating that these ancient giants persisted on the island until approximately 4,000 years ago — a ghostly reminder of what the sanctuary now guards.

A Deep Geological Archive

The bedrock of Wrangel Island is a compressed record of nearly half a billion years of Earth history, spanning from the Upper Precambrian through the Lower Mesozoic. The oldest layers, roughly two kilometres thick, are Upper Proterozoic sericite and chlorite slates and schists intermixed with minor metavolcanic rocks, metaconglomerates, and quartzite. These ancient strata were pierced by metamorphosed gabbro, diabase, felsic dikes and sills, and granite intrusions. Above them lie up to 2.25 kilometres of Upper Silurian to Lower Carboniferous interbedded sandstone, siltstone, slate, and argillite, with occasional conglomerate, limestone, and dolomite. The next major unit, reaching 2.15 kilometres in thickness, is Carboniferous to Permian limestone — much of it built from crinoid plates — interbedded with slate, argillite, and locally thick breccia, sandstone, and chert. Capping the sequence are 0.7 to 1.5 kilometres of Triassic clayey quartzose turbidites alternating with black slate and siltstone. A thin veneer of Cenozoic gravel, sand, clay, and mud drapes the coastal plains, with Late Neogene clays and gravels of only tens of metres resting on the eroded folded surface beneath.

A Name Without a Visitor

The island bears the name of Baron Ferdinand von Wrangel, a Baltic German explorer and Admiral in the Imperial Russian Navy, yet the man himself never set foot on the land that carries his name. During his Kolymskaya expedition of 1823–1824, von Wrangel observed flocks of birds streaming northward and, after questioning the indigenous Chukchi people, concluded that an island unknown to Europeans must exist in the Arctic Ocean. He spent three consecutive years north of the 68th parallel searching for it, but the island eluded him. It was not until 1867 that Captain Thomas Long formally christened the land "Wrangell Land," publishing his tribute in The Honolulu Advertiser. Long framed the naming as a fitting homage to a man who had demonstrated the reality of the open polar sea forty-five years earlier, even though others of later date had tried to claim that discovery for themselves. The indigenous Chukot people, meanwhile, had their own name for the place: Umqiḷir, meaning simply "island of polar bears."