Notes on the sea-ice along the east coast of Greenland. 207 
The body of ice between the east coast of Greenland has an average 
breadth of about 200 miles. This mass of ice is continually moving 
from north to south, and in the drift of ships beset on the ice or the 
ice-drift itself (the time the pack takes to pass from Angmagsalik 
to Cape Farvel), we have material to determine approximately the 
velocity of this drift. This velocity is different in the outer and inner 
edge of the ice-belt, and also different in the northerly and southerly 
end of the ice-stream. 
The material on the strength of which the velocity of the drift is 
determined, is much more satisfactory from Angmagsalik to Cape Far- 
vel than further north, owing to the possibility of ascertaining when 
the first part of the main-pack in the autumn passes Angmagsalik as 
well as Cape Farvelt. 
Owing to this fact it is possible to judge of the velocity of the drift 
almost every year, and its average velocity for fifteen years is 6,5 miles 
a day (see the table on p. 206). Its greatest velocity is 16 miles a day 
(1902) and its smallest 4 (1897, 1904, 1906). The drift-velocity of the 
whaling fleet 1777 (see p. 208) and of Nansen 1888 is however greater, 
respectively 18 and 23 miles a day, and the drift of the “Hansa” crew 
1870 (see p. 208) is smaller, 3,2 miles a day, but this drift was partly 
performed in the heart of the winter, and the floe on which the crew 
drifted was so close inland that its velocity must have been retarded by 
its freezing on to the land-ice. 
The velocity of the drift from Angmagsalik and northward along 
the east coast of Greenland is, however, more complicated, and the result 
of a generalization cannot be considered nearly as accurate nor as close 
to the actual average velocity as on the stretch Angmagsalik—Cape 
Farvel, owing partly to the scarceness of material, but also to the 
fact that it is often difficult to decide, whether a drift should be considered 
as belonging to the inner or outer half of the ice-stream. 
As a Базз for calculating the rate of drifting of the ice-mass 
off the east coast of Greenland the following data are available: 
1769. Four ships were ice-bound at 76° N. Lat. at the beginning of 
July. Two of them were wrecked in the pack, whilst the 
others liberated themselves from the ice the 16.—19. Nov. at 
69° №. Lat. (Normann, Geografisk Tidsskrift, 1878.) 
The ships had drifted 480 miles in 125 days, being a daily 
average of about 4 miles. 
1777. A whaling fleet blocked at about 79° N. Lat. and 6° E. Long. 
on the 24th June. Drifted with the ice southward, and the last 
+ Ice-observations for the different years from 1894—1913. “The State of 
the Ice in the Arctic Seas” is every year published by the Danish Meteorological 
Institute. 
