Kaffeklubben Island or Coffee Club Island (Danish: Kaffeklubben Ø; Greenlandic: Inuit Qeqertaat) is an uninhabited island lying off the northern shore of Greenland. It contains the northernmost undisputed point of land on Earth.
Kaffeklubben Island or Coffee Club Island (Danish: Kaffeklubben Ø; Greenlandic: Inuit Qeqertaat) is an uninhabited island lying off the northern shore of Greenland. It contains the northernmost undisputed point of land on Earth.
The North Pole, also known as the Geographic North Pole or Terrestrial North Pole, is the point in the Northern Hemisphere where the Earth's axis of rotation meets its surface. It is called the True North Pole to distinguish from the Magnetic North Pole.
The North Pole is by definition the northernmost point on the Earth, lying antipodally to the South Pole. It defines geodetic latitude 90° North, as well as the direction of true north. At the North Pole all directions point south; all lines of longitude converge there, so its longitude can be defined as any degree value. No time zone has been assigned to the North Pole, so any time can be used as the local time. Along tight latitude circles, counterclockwise is east and clockwise is west. The North Pole is at the center of the Northern Hemisphere. The nearest land is usually said to be Kaffeklubben Island, off the northern coast of Greenland about 700 km (430 mi) away, though some perhaps semi-permanent gravel banks lie slightly closer. The nearest permanently inhabited place is Alert on Ellesmere Island, Canada, which is located 817 km (508 mi) from the Pole.
Greenland is an autonomous territory in the Kingdom of Denmark. It is by far the largest geographically of three constituent parts of the kingdom; the other two are metropolitan Denmark and the Faroe Islands. It shares a small 1.2 km border with Canada on Hans Island. Citizens of Greenland are full citizens of Denmark and of the European Union. Greenland is one of the Overseas Countries and Territories of the European Union and is part of the Council of Europe. It is the world's largest island, and lies between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Greenland's Kaffeklubben Island, off the northern coast, is the world's northernmost undisputed point of land—Cape Morris Jesup on the mainland was thought to be so until the 1960s. The capital and largest city is Nuuk. Economically, Greenland is heavily reliant on aid from Denmark, amounting to nearly half of the territory's total public revenue.
Though a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with the European kingdoms of Norway and Denmark for more than a millennium, beginning in 986. Greenland has been inhabited at intervals over at least the last 4,500 years by circumpolar peoples whose forebears migrated there from what is now Canada. Norsemen from Norway settled the uninhabited southern part of Greenland beginning in the 10th century (having previously settled Iceland), and their descendants lived in Greenland for 400 years until disappearing in the late 15th century. The 13th century saw the arrival of Inuit.
The northernmost point of land on Earth is a contentious issue due to variation of definition. How permanent some of the contenders are makes hard determination difficult, but sets an important threshold. Problematic issues include ice sheets, water movements and inundation, storm activity that may build, shift, or destroy banks of moraine material, and observational difficulties due to remoteness. However, a bathymetric survey in 2022 confirmed that certain previous contenders, such as 83-42, Qeqertaq Avannarleq, and ATOW1996 are not permanent islands/landmasses, as they are not connected to the seabed, and are only gravel banks floating on an ice sheet.
The following table sets out the main contenders (or previous contenders) for this title.
Ellesmere Island (Inuktitut: ᐅᒥᖕᒪᒃ ᓄᓇ, romanized: Umingmak Nuna, lit. 'land of muskoxen'; French: île d'Ellesmere) is Canada's northernmost and third largest island, and the tenth largest in the world. It comprises an area of 196,236 km (75,767 sq mi), slightly smaller than Great Britain, and the total length of the island is 830 km (520 mi).
Lying within the Arctic Archipelago, Ellesmere Island is considered part of the Queen Elizabeth Islands. Cape Columbia at 83°06′41″N 069°57′13″W / 83.11139°N 69.95361°W is the most northerly point of land in Canada and one of the most northern points of land on the planet (the most northerly point of land on Earth is the nearby Kaffeklubben Island of Greenland).