Thule Island, also called Morrell Island, is one of the southernmost of the

South Sandwich Islands ) , anthem = "God Save the King" , song_type = , song = , image_map = South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands in United Kingdom.svg , map_caption = Location of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands in the southern Atlantic Oce ...

, part of the grouping known as Southern Thule. It is named, on account of its remote location, after the mythical land of

Thule Thule ( grc-gre, Θούλη, Thoúlē; la, Thūlē) is the most northerly location mentioned in ancient Greek and Roman literature and cartography. Modern interpretations have included Orkney, Shetland, northern Scotland, the island of Saar ...

, said by ancient geographers to lie at the extreme end of the Earth. The alternative name Morrell Island is after

Benjamin Morrell Benjamin Morrell (July 5, 1795 – 1838 or 1839?) was an American sea captain, explorer and trader who made a number of voyages, mainly to the Atlantic, the Southern Ocean and the Pacific Islands. In a ghost-written memoir, ''A Narrative of Four ...

, an American explorer and whaling captain. It was espied by

James Cook James Cook (7 November 1728 Old Style date: 27 October – 14 February 1779) was a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the British Royal Navy, famous for his three voyages between 1768 and 1779 in the Pacific Ocean and ...

and his '' Resolution'' crew on 31 January 1775 during his attempt to find

Terra Australis (Latin: '"Southern Land'") was a hypothetical continent first posited in antiquity and which appeared on maps between the 15th and 18th centuries. Its existence was not based on any survey or direct observation, but rather on the idea that ...

Geography

Thule Island is approximately triangular in shape and in area with a long, panhandle-like peninsula called Hewison Point, , extending to the southeast. Steep slopes ascend to a summit

caldera A caldera ( ) is a large cauldron-like hollow that forms shortly after the emptying of a magma chamber in a volcano eruption. When large volumes of magma are erupted over a short time, structural support for the rock above the magma chamber is ...

with the peak of Mount Larsen at above sea level. Mount Larsen is named after the Antarctic explorer and whaler

Carl Anton Larsen Carl Anton Larsen (7 August 1860 – 8 December 1924) was a Norwegian-born whaler and Antarctic explorer who made important contributions to the exploration of Antarctica, the most significant being the first discovery of fossils for which ...

. On the southwestern end lies Wasp Point. Off Hewison Point lies the small islet of Twitcher Rock, the southernmost land on Earth except for part of Cook Island,

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest cont ...

and offshore islands considered part of Antarctica. Thule Island is the westernmost of Southern Thule island group, which also encompasses Cook Island and

Bellingshausen Island Bellingshausen Island is one of the most southerly of the South Sandwich Islands, close to Thule Island and Cook Island, and forming part of the Southern Thule group. It is named after its discoverer, Baltic German-Russian Antarctic explorer ...

. It is thought that Thule and Cook may have been a larger single island in the past, and there is evidence for a submerged crater between the two. Steam from the summit

crater lake Crater Lake ( Klamath: ''Giiwas'') is a volcanic crater lake in south-central Oregon in the western United States. It is the main feature of Crater Lake National Park and is famous for its deep blue color and water clarity. The lake partly fill ...

and ash on the flank were reported in 1962. Volcanic heat keeps the crater on Thule Island free from ice. The peak elevation is .

Argentine occupation

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest ...

, in order to assert its claim over the South Sandwich Islands, established the summer station ''Teniente Esquivel'' at Ferguson Bay on the southeastern coast on January 25, 1955. The station had to be evacuated in January 1956 because of

volcanic A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plat ...

eruption of Mount Holdgate (so named in 1964) on the neighboring Cook Island to the east. In 1976 it established a military base on Thule Island called Corbeta Uruguay (Port Faraday) in the lee (southern east coast) of the island. The British discovered the presence of the Argentine base the same year but chose to pursue a diplomatic solution to the issue until the breakout of the

Falklands War The Falklands War ( es, link=no, Guerra de las Malvinas) was a ten-week undeclared war between Argentina and the United Kingdom in 1982 over two British dependent territories in the South Atlantic: the Falkland Islands and its territorial ...

in 1982. The base was occupied by British forces in the aftermath of the war and eventually destroyed later that year. Stonehouse, Bernard (2002)
''Encyclopedia of Antarctica and the southern oceans''
Wiley, p. 264,

References

Notes

Sources

* *
volcano.und.edu
*

External links