A person has been ordered to pay 50,000 kroner (about £3,890) after using a foghorn to wake a sleeping polar bear in Norway’s Arctic Svalbard archipelago, local officials confirmed on Thursday.
The incident took place earlier this month when a vessel sailing through a fjord in north-western Svalbard, roughly 1,000km (620 miles) from the North Pole, passed near the animal. Governor Lars Fause said in a statement that those on board spotted the polar bear dozing on land, and one individual then sounded the ship’s foghorn, rousing the bear and prompting it to move to another spot.
The unnamed individual has agreed to pay the penalty. The fine was issued under the Svalbard Environment Act, which makes it illegal to needlessly disturb, attract, or pursue polar bears. The species has been protected in the archipelago since 1972, with the most recent scientific estimate in 2015 recording around 250 polar bears in the area.
The governor’s office emphasized that all activity in Svalbard must be carried out in a way that avoids unnecessary disturbance of local wildlife, including polar bears, seals, whales, reindeer, and Arctic foxes. The enforcement highlights the strict rules designed to protect both people and these large predators.
This is not the first such penalty in the region. In 2024, a tourist was fined 11,500 kroner (about £900) for getting too close to a walrus.