Narsarsuaq put Greenland on the world map

It was 85 years of Greenlandic aviation history that came to an end when the airport in Narsarsuaq closed last week.

Perhaps a new chapter is lurking if the Americans are serious about establishing a military base in Narsarsuaq – and that could close the loop, because it was also the Americans who put Narsarsuaq on the world map in the first place.

The construction of the American base in Narsarsuaq began on July 6, 1941. The United States needed airfields in Greenland where planes en route from the American continent to Europe could make stopovers.

The base was established as a result of the "lend and lease" agreement that the USA entered into with the Allied states in Europe, in which the Americans were to supply the warring countries with equipment for the fight against Nazi Germany - and thus six months before Pearl Harbor (December 7, 1941), when the USA itself became an active participant in the war.

Among other things, the agreement required that three bases be established in Greenland as a way station between North America and Europe. The three bases were Kangerlussuq (BW8, Sondrestrom), Narsarsuaq (BW1) and Ikateq (BE2). It was so cleverly conceived that due to the special meteorological conditions around the Greenland ice sheet, it could never be bad weather in all three places at the same time.

Enormous time pressure

The construction work took place under enormous time pressure - and it only took six months for the first plane to land in early 1942.

It is estimated that more than 10,000 planes stopped in Narsarsuaq during the war - and in the last days of the war, there were hundreds of planes every day. When the World War ended after the atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Americans remained at Narsarsuaq.

The base had its second period of glory during the Korean War (1950 - 1953), when Narsarsuaq was an important support point with more than 5,000 men stationed. Among other things, the base was used when wounded soldiers had to be flown home - and a hospital with 250 beds was built in the valley behind the airfield. The foundation and a single chimney from the hospital can still be seen today at the site.

The Americans left Narsarsuaq on November 11, 1958, after which the base was given the status of a “solitarily located Radio/weather station” with a Danish crew of 10 men.

When the Hans Hedtoft sank in 1959, it became clear to the Danish authorities that a civilian airport was needed in South Greenland – among other things to house the Ice Reporting Service. With the reopening, Narsarsuaq also became a traffic hub in Greenland – both from Denmark, Iceland and not least Nuuk, when the capital got its first airport in 1979.

Tourist destination

With the planes came tourists – and Narsarsuaq has been a very popular destination, not least for hiking tourists. So far, it is unknown what the closure will mean for tourism.

Narsarsuaq is also home to the Greenland Arboretum, which was officially inaugurated in 2004, but where the first trees were planted as early as 1966. The purpose of the arboretum is to investigate which tree species are best suited to the Greenlandic climate.

The arboretum covers an area of ​​150 ha (1.5 km2), where more than 130,000 plants, divided into over 200 species and 600 seed lots, have been planted. How many of these species and seed lots are still alive is not known precisely, but the arboretum means that Narsarsuaq is surrounded by lush forest and tall trees – and living scientific proof that many tree species can thrive in Greenland.

Business history

Narsarsuaq has also written its mark on Greenland's business history, as it was here that businessman and art collector Svend Junge, who died in 2007, made his first million. He told about this in an interview with AG in 1999.

Junge, who ran a construction business in Nuuk, had been awarded the contract to demolish one of the old American hangars. He noticed a building over 100 metres long that the Americans had used as a potato warehouse, so he bought it for 10,000 kroner.

Svend Junge, who had come to Greenland as a floorlayer, had noticed that the building had an unusually heavy floor, so that heavy trucks could be driven on it.

- The floor was a real gold mine. At the bottom was a system of 16x16 inch beams of very high quality. On top were 12x12 inches of the same quality, on top of them 8x8 and on top the floorboards themselves.

- It was actually my plan to move the whole thing to Nuuk, but I didn't get that far. Because it quickly became known that I had the best timber that was needed in all of Greenland. Some of it was sold to Nordafar, where half of the long quay is built from my timber.

- So without lifting a finger, I earned a million kroner – and that was a lot of money back then, Svend Junge told AG in 1999.