Igalik Island is an Arctic barrier island, the easternmost of the Plover Islands, approximately 2.5 miles (4 km) long, located at the entrance to Dease Inlet, about 36 miles (58 km) east-southeast of Utqiagvik, Alaska. The Iñupiat name for the island, reported by Leffingwell in 1910, means “window.” Dease Inlet is a bay approximately 7 miles (11 km) wide, situated between Christie and Tangent Points on the Arctic Coastal Plain. The bay was named by Thomas Simpson on August 2, 1837, in honor of Peter Warren Dease. The Iñupiat name for the bay is “Kilulea,” as shown on charts from 1864 by Commander Rochfort Maguire of the British Royal Navy.

Since the era of Russian, European, and American exploration and exploitation of the Arctic, dozens of ships have been wrecked off the coast of Alaska. Early explorers of the Northwest Passage often faced ships becoming trapped and crushed by moving ice. During the American Civil War, from 1864 to 1865, the Confederate Navy’s CSS Shenandoah conducted commerce raiding to disrupt the U.S. economy. This resulted in the capture, sinking, or bonding of 38 merchant vessels, mostly New Bedford whaling ships. In 1871, a fleet of 33 American whaling ships was trapped by Arctic ice and subsequently abandoned. During World War II and the subsequent Cold War, the U.S. military established outposts along the coast that required a constant supply of fuel and other essentials delivered by barge. Many of these barges broke free from their towboats, either drifting out to sea or washing ashore. Today, one such barge rests on Cooper Island, while another is found on Igalik Island.

The Canadian Arctic Expedition of 1913–16, led by Vilhjalmur Stefansson, was a scientific voyage in the Arctic Circle. However, 1913 proved to be a particularly challenging year for Arctic navigation. All the expedition’s ships became icebound before reaching their initial destination, Herschel Island. The principal ship, the Karluk, drifted in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, eventually being crushed by ice and sinking. The crew and expedition staff survived on the ice, eventually making their way to Wrangell Island. Eleven men perished before the survivors were rescued by the vessel King & Winge in September 1914. Read more here and here. Explore more of Igalik Island and Dease Inlet here: