21 years later, we are back at Kangerlussuaq Airport. How time flies.
Kangerlussuaq means “the big/long fjord.” The fjord stretches roughly 190 km from the Davis Strait inland toward the Greenland Ice Sheet.
The modern settlement began as an American military airbase in 1941, when the United States established Bluie West-8 during the Second World War. It later became Sondrestrom Air Base during the Cold War. The base was important for aircraft travelling across the Arctic and for supporting the DEW Line early-warning system. The U.S. military presence continued until 1992, after which the site became a Greenlandic settlement.
