Luftskipsmasta (Airship Tower)

In 1926, Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen flew his airship Norge over the North Pole, making him and his crew the first people to fly over the northernmost point on the planet.

On the way, Amundsen’s airship stopped at several mooring towers for refueling. One of those towers still stands on Vadsøya, the island just off the coast of Vadsø in the extreme northeast of Norway. The Varanger peninsula is a remote and beautiful place and you can only wonder at the sight of this huge airship arriving there in 1926.

Amundsen actually boarded the airship at Ny-Ålesund in Svalbard, where a similar (if not identical) mast can still be seen. The Italian explorer Umberto Nobile came to Vadsø twice en route to the North Pole, once as the pilot on the Norge, and again in 1928 on his own airship, Italia. 

Today Vadso uses the mast as its emblem on official papers.