Utqiagvik started the longest polar night yesterday: 65 days without seeing the sun

The next winter solstice will be on December 21, 2021. For many locations in Alaska, this means living extremely short days or even no sunlight at all.

The impact varies a lot, depending on the location of each place. While in Juneau, for example, it is possible to have more than six hours of sunlight even in the depths of winter, other cities like Fairbanks have almost half of this solar endowment.

One night of 65 days

The most extreme case is that of Utqiagvik, a town in Alaska located about 600 kilometers north of the so-called Arctic Circle, the border that contains the area where the “midnight sun” occurs, and 2,100 kilometers south of the North Pole.

Starting this November 18, and for 65 days, Utqiagvik will be at night. Its inhabitants, almost 5,000, will see the sun again until the end of January 2022, the 22nd at the earliest, according to the Fairbanks Weather Service.

The deed of the Iñupiat

Until 2016, Utqiagvik was known as the English name Barrow. But a referendum resulted in the change of the official name to the denomination of the Iñupiat ethnic group, predominant in the area. Utqiagvik means “place where the wild roots are”.

Winter in Utqiagvik is so harsh that it is not possible to supply the town during the deepest phase of winter. For this reason, its inhabitants must organize in advance the entire supply of food and goods necessary to survive the onslaught of the weather, in the northernmost population of all Alaska.

Utqiagvik is the sister city of Ushuaia, in Argentina, and Puerto Williams, in Chile, both located at the other end of the world. (I)