The town of Longyearbyen is known as the world’s most northernmost settlement (with a population greater than 1,000). It is located on Svalbard, a Norwegian-owned archipelago between mainland Norway and the North Pole. The land is mostly uninhabited and is home to glaciers, polar bears, and Svalbard reindeer.

Longyearbyen translates to “The Longyear Town,” and it was established in 1906 by the Arctic Coal Company. Due to its isolation, Longyearbyen is home to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a vault that acts as a secure backup of the world’s crop diversity in case of a worldwide catastrophic failure.