Jungfraujoch
Jungfraujoch | |
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![]() View from the south side of the pass |
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Elevation | 3,471 m (11,388 ft)[1] |
Traversed by | Leslie Stephen and party (1862) |
Location | Bern/Valais, Switzerland |
Range | Bernese Alps |
Coordinates | 46°32′51″N 7°58′45″E / 46.5475°N 7.97917°ECoordinates: 46°32′51″N 7°58′45″E / 46.5475°N 7.97917°E |
Location in Switzerland |
The Jungfraujoch is a col or saddle between the Mönch and the Jungfrau in the Bernese Alps on the boundary between the cantons of Bern and Valais, inside the Jungfrau-Aletsch Protected Area.
Strictly, the Jungfraujoch is the lowest point on the mountain ridge between Mönch and Jungfrau, at 3,471 meters (11,388 ft). It is just above this location that the mountain station of Jungfraubahn is located, Jungfraujoch railway station, which at an elevation of 3,454 meters (11,332 ft) is the highest railway station in Europe. The Jungfraujoch is often called the "Top of Europe" in tourist literature.
The Sphinx (3,571 meters (11,716 ft)) is a peak that lies just to the east of the col. It begins from the Jungfraujoch on the Valais side and at the Great Aletsch Glacier. There is an elevator to its summit, where a small viewing platform and a scientific observatory, the Sphinx Observatory, are located. Europe's highest radio relay station, the Richtfunkstation Jungfraujoch, is installed atop the ridge to the west of the railway station.
The Jungfraujoch houses one of the Global Atmosphere Watch's atmospheric research stations. The Jungfraujoch can only be reached through a 7.3 km long cog railway tunnel, served by the Jungfraubahn, the highest in a series of cooperating railway companies that provide access to the Jungfraujoch from Interlaken.
Contents |
[edit] First crossing
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This section may require copy-editing for better grammar, less poetic style. I suspect that part of the text is directly taken from the book by John Ball (which is in the public domain). |
There is a tradition in the Bernese Oberland, supported by some documentary evidence, that a pass existed between Grindelwald and Fiesch in Valais, four or five centuries ago, before the increase of the glaciers blocked it. In modern times the old pass's precise location is a matter of uncertainty. Since a hotel on the Eggishorn has been frequented by English mountaineers, the possibility of traversing the great ridge that encloses the head of the Aletsch Glacier, and connecting the Eggishorn with Grindelwald and Wengern Alp, has of interest, and a topographical problem which has excited adventurous mountaineers. The result has been, that no less than four such passes have been effected. Two of the number—the Jungfraujoch and the Eigerjoch—are among the most difficult passes in the Alps.[2]
There was no serious attempt to climb the northern side of the Jungfraujoch until some adventurous members of the Alpine Club were emboldened by the success of an almost equally hopelesslooking enterprise, the passage of the Eigerjoch. Two separate parties, intent upon the same design, happened to meet in Grindelwald in July 1862, and resolved to join their forces for the climb. The successful party consisted of Leslie Stephen, F. J. Hardy, H. B. George, Liveing, Moore, and Morgan, with Christian Almer, Christian and Peter Michel, Ulrich Kauffmann, P. Baumann, and C. Bohren, as guides. As on many other difficult expeditions, the two first guides especially distinguished themselves. The party having been forced to return on the first day for want of the means for bridging over a great bergschrund, returned on the following day with a ladder 25 ft (7.6 m). in length, borne by Peter Rubi, a porter from Grindelwald. The way lay at first by the rocky buttress of the Mönch, separating the Eiger and Guggi Glaciers. From the buttress it was necessary to descend a little in order to reach the Guggi Glacier, which could be ascended without meeting serious obstacles as far as a considerable plateau, scarcely seen from the Wengern Alp. This haltingplace, reached in about 3 hours, was located immediately under the most difficult and dangerous part of the ascent. In front a pile of ice debris, lying along the base of a high ledge of rocks, seemed to offer a possible route; but the débris was produced by the fall of masses of ice from an upper shelf of glacier, and an attempt to ascend in that direction was found to be not only highly dangerous, but beset with insurmountable obstacles. To the right the glacier descended in shattered masses, divided by yawning crevasses. The impending towers and pinnacles, along and around which it was necessary to climb or creep by steps hewn with the ice-axe momentarily threaten the climbers with destruction; and the frequent recurrence of crumbling blocks of ice proved the fragility of the material and the frequency of avalanches. Towards the summit was a great bergschrund, in most places 30 ft (9.1 m). wide, traversing the whole width of the glacier, and impassable without a long ladder.
![](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/web/20121023082605im_/http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/24/2009_Jungfraujoch.jpg/220px-2009_Jungfraujoch.jpg)
Above the bergschrund was a second and smaller plateau which was situated immediately under the long slopes of broken neve that lay below the col. Fully 2 hours were needed to reach this from the lower plateau. Here there was a clear view of the last very arduous stage in the ascent, a single patch of dark rocks jutted out from the snow in the ridge connecting the Jungfrau with the Mönch. To the left of this the névé, broken in huge seracs, whose interstices were filled with snow, lay at an angle of between 50° and 60°, the whole being irregularly cut through by crevasses. To the right of the rocks the névé lay in a more even, but still steeper slope; and after an attempt made by C. Almer and C. Michel to cut their way up it, the hardness of the snow and the perilous steepness of the wall induced them to return in order to try the alternative course by the seracs. This lay to the left of the last rocks, and though excessively steep, involved less of real risk than the lower portion of the ascent. After more than an hour of climb, direct progress was arrested by a great wall of ice, whose projecting cornice of snow was fringed by long icicles. It was necessary to bear to the left in the direction of the Mönch, along the base of the wall by a slippery pathway of ice formed from the dripping from the icicles above. At a point where the pathway thinned out nearly to a point, and was cut across by a transverse crevasse, the wall became low enough to be scaled by the ladder. This was the last serious obstacle: a moderate slope of névé, unbroken by crevasses, then led up to the summit of the pass, which was attained in 9 hours from the Wengern Alp. After reaching the first patch of rocks, a short way below the col on the south side, the party divided: George and Moore, with C. Almer and U. Kaufmann went down to the Eggishorn, while the remainder of the party returned to Grindelwald by the Mönchsjoch.[2]
[edit] Jungfraujoch railway
[edit] History
Adolf Guyer-Zeller first thought of the idea of a tunnel in 1893 and at that point he had planned to have 7 stations inside the tunnel before reaching what is now the Sphinx. The building of the tunnel started on July 27, 1896 and took 16 years to complete.[3] The construction phase was troubled by many problems including monetary shortages, inclement weather and mounting deaths due to construction accidents. The worst accident occurred in 1908, when 30 tons of dynamite accidentally exploded.
Once construction was halted, the tunnel reached only to the height of the Jungfraujoch, rather than the Sphinx, with only two intermediate stations. However, even in its current state, the Jungfraubahn is a significant achievement in engineering and construction, still holding the title for highest railway in Europe.
[edit] Railway
![](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/web/20121023082605im_/http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f8/Bahnhof_Jungfraujoch.jpg/220px-Bahnhof_Jungfraujoch.jpg)
The train into the mountain leaves from Kleine Scheidegg, which can be reached by trains from Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen. The train enters the tunnel running eastward through the Eiger shortly after leaving Kleine Scheidegg.
It runs close behind the Eiger's north face, stopping at Eigerwand, where there is a window about 8 m long and a metre high, halfway up the face. The windows have been placed in holes used to remove excavated rock from the tunnel during construction, and are also occasionally used as access points, by climbers, and also rescue parties. This window was used for one of the final scenes of a Clint Eastwood spy movie the The Eiger Sanction. There one can get off the train to admire the view before the train continues five minutes later. The tunnel then turns west, heading towards the Jungfrau. There is a second stop at a window looking out on the Eismeer ("Sea of Ice") before the train continues to the Jungfraujoch. The tunnel was constructed between 1898 and 1912; it is about 7 kilometers (4.3 mi) long, with gradients of up to 25%. The journey from Kleine Scheidegg to Jungfraujoch takes approximately 50 minutes including the stops at Eigerwand and Eismeer; the downhill return journey taking only 35 minutes.
The Jungfraujoch complex plays an important role in John Christopher's The Tripods novels.
[edit] Weather
Climate data for Jungfraujoch | |||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
Average high °C (°F) | −10.3 (13.5) |
−10.7 (12.7) |
−8.8 (16.2) |
−7.8 (18.0) |
−3.7 (25.3) |
−0.8 (30.6) |
1.7 (35.1) |
1.6 (34.9) |
0.2 (32.4) |
−2.5 (27.5) |
−7.2 (19.0) |
−9.2 (15.4) |
−4.9 (23.2) |
Daily mean °C (°F) | −13.6 (7.5) |
−14.2 (6.4) |
−13.1 (8.4) |
−10.8 (12.6) |
−6.7 (19.9) |
−3.7 (25.3) |
−1.2 (29.8) |
−1.2 (29.8) |
−2.6 (27.3) |
−5.2 (22.6) |
−10.4 (13.3) |
−12.3 (9.9) |
−7.9 (17.8) |
Average low °C (°F) | −16.6 (2.1) |
−16.8 (1.8) |
−15.7 (3.7) |
−13.4 (7.9) |
−9 (16) |
−5.9 (21.4) |
−3.4 (25.9) |
−3.3 (26.1) |
−5.1 (22.8) |
−7.6 (18.3) |
−12.8 (9.0) |
−15.3 (4.5) |
−10.4 (13.3) |
Source: MeteoSchweiz [4] |
[edit] Gallery
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Retrieved from the Swisstopo topographic maps
- ^ a b John Ball, The Alpine guide, Central Alps, p. 106, 1866, London
- ^ Jungfraubahn - History of the Jungfrau Railway
- ^ "Temperature and Precipitation Average Values-Table, 1961-1990" (in German, French, Italian). Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology MeteoSwiss. http://www.meteoswiss.admin.ch/web/de/klima/klima_schweiz/tabellen.html. Retrieved 8 May 2009.
[edit] External links
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