GEOGRAPHY OF GREENLAND, ICELAND, AND SPITSBERGEN 



GREENLAND 



The Danish island of Greenland is the largest island in the world, 

 1,650 miles long and 690 miles wide at its greatest breadth. Its 

 interior is covered by a vast ice cap. The land surface beneath 

 the ice is believed to be low in the center with mountain ranges 

 along the eastern and western coasts. The eastern ranges reach 

 heights of 11,000 feet. Ice fills the saucerlike, central basin. 

 There are two domes on the east side of the cap, one at about 65° N. 

 which rises to over 8,000 feet and one near 75° N. rising some 

 10,000 feet. From these domes the ice surface slopes gradually- 

 downward, being almost flat across the interior of the island, and 

 bacoming steep near the margins. 



The ice at the edge is relatively thin with bare, rocky peaks or 

 nunataks protruding. Glaciers flow down from the cap through 

 the many fiords that dissect the coast. The inland ice is fed from 



flCEAH 

 Figure 2-18. — Greenland, largest island in the world. 



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