Post by Catsmate on Apr 19, 2015 17:01:51 GMT
Inspired by rulandor in the Disappearing Island thread I've dog out some old notes and here are eight interesting islands, ranging from arctic to tropical, suitable for adventures and encounters.
1. Bear Island.
Actually there are more than twenty 'Bear islands' around the world.We start at the top of the world, at 74°31' N 19°01' E, Bear Island is the southernmost of the Svalbard islands and is currently uninhabited. In fact through most of it's known history (which stated in 1596) it's been uninhabited with few natural resources (coal has been sporadically mined) but an interesting strategic position in the Barents Sea. This led to disputes between Russia and Germany (and Norway) before the First World War but the island was officially unclaimed until 1920 when it became Norwegian.
Twenty years later the strategic position became even more important as the convoys to Murmansk and other Soviet ports passed nearby. Nazi Germany established weather stations and facilities to monitor radio traffic from Allied convoys and the waters around the island became a battleground on many occasions as German aircraft and submarines (plus occasional surface warships) attacked the convoys.
I was introduced to the island by Alistair MacLean's novel which features a film company operating on the island ostensibly filming a WW2 movie, but with several plots in the background featuring Nazi gold. Now historically there were no submarine bases there, but in the Whoniverse it would have been a test sites for any Nazi Mad Science, alien weapons, inter-dimensional portals, flying saucers or time machines could all have been tested there. And might still be there, waiting for someone to rediscover them, perhaps adding a little international rivalry (in the mode of MacLean's Ice Station Zebra) to the mix.
I'll leave the last comment to the fictional Captain Imrie.
2. Svalbard
Svalbard is technically a region rather than a specific island, and includes Bear Island. However the rest of the area is actually inhabited by humans (and polar bears) so I've separated it.
This remote and craggy Norwegian territory is surprisingly well populated, with a mix of scientists, miners and tourists, and has all the facilities expected in an isolated settlement (schools, hospital, university, newspaper et cetera).
Tourists flock there annually to watch the majestic polar bears in their natural habitat, and occasionally be killed by them. Killing bears for sport is illegal but it is mandatory for travellers outside of settlement to be armed in case of bear
attack.
Like Bear Island Svalbard experiences the constant sunlight of the Arctic summer; from 20 April 20 to 23 August (approximately), the sun never sets over Svalbard. A phenomenon which can play havoc with people's bodily clocks.
Possible adventures on Svalbard include the classic Doctor Who motif of something weird being found/dug up and the party being called in to examine it (spaceship/psionic crystal/alien hand/gelatinous blob et cetera). During the UNIT era this can have some interesting complications due to the Soviet (and later Russian) presence. Otherwise it's a good place for secret research (though probably not in reality due to the small community) which goes horribly wrong. Encounters with officious Norwegian bureaucrats, retired Soviet spies, scientists with something to hide and of course polar bears (standard or alien possessed/cybernetically enhanced/maddened by alien chemicals/mind controlled).
The recent television series Fortitude is set on Svalbard and could be a useful basis for an adventure.
3. Gruinard Island
Not quite as cold and bleak as the two previous islands there's a rather different reason to avoid this Scottish island; actual mad science went on here in the form of British experiments with anthrax.
In 1942 the British government was interested in the use of anthrax as a biological weapon and needed somewhere suitably isolated to carry out tests, the uninhabited small island of Gruinard just off the west coast of Scotland was requisitioned.
Sheep and goats were brought to the island and bombs loaded with spores of a particularly nasty strain of anthrax detonated to test the effects. It was determined that the soil would remain contaminated with anthrax spores for decades and the island was quarantined, visited only by occasional teams from the British CBW facility a Porton Down. Sporadic attempts were made at decontamination but these weren't pursued until the mid 1980s. During the war corpses and remains of the test animals washed ashore and caused a minor outbreak of anthrax.
In 1982 a group using the name 'Operation Dark Harvest' removed soil from the island and sent it to Porton Down and to the UK Conservative party (then in power) conference demanding the island be decontaminated. In 1986 efforts began and about 300 tonnes of formaldehyde was mixed with seawater and sprayed on the island, with some soil from anthrax 'hot spots' removed and cleansed by heating to destroy spores. in 1990 the process was complete
and the island declared safe. It is currently being considered as a site for storage of radioactive waste.
Gaming potential. Well there's the classic trope of the players arriving accidentally and unknowingly on the island and are exposed as they blunder around (did anyone pack doxycycline?). Of course maybe the island was used for testing something worse than anthrax and the contamination story just a ruse. Or was something found there that needed to be kept quite?
4. Surtsey.
Unlike Sarah Anne island (which disappeared) Surtsey is an example of an appearing island, the product of volcanic activity of the coast of Iceland. Starting in 1963 and lasting until 1967 millions of tonnes of molten rock were released underwater to form the small (originally 2.8km2 now about 1.4km2). Within a few years plant life arrived, then insects, birds and seals. Now there are a few bushes, gull colonies and earthworms. This has been of great interest to naturalists who've extensvely studied the creation of a new ecosystem. There is no pennant settlement, just a prefabricated cabin and strict rules on not contaminating the island.
Gaming uses. A new island isn't just a site for research. It could have a useful strategic location during the Cold War, leading to conflict over ownership. Then there's the volcanic eruption that formed Surtsey, was it really a natural phenomenom? Or did someone trigger it, and why? Was an alien/Silurian/Mad Scientist attempting to create an island base?
<This would be where Eilean Mòr would go but I'm keeping the mystery of Flannan lighthouse for another time>
5. Tiburón Island
Tiburón Island is the largest island in Mexico, around 1,200km², on the eastern short of the Gulf of California. It’s not a particularly pleasant place, barren, hot and with numerous venomous animals, as well as being home to an isolated group of humans called the Seri who have long been labeled as cannibals. However it's also also long been reputed to
contain untold riches and precious metals.
This lead to the Tiburón Island Tragedy of 1905 where four American prospectors died on the island. Led by Thomas Grindell they set out on 10 June 10th, promising to be back by the end of July. They never returned. Grindell’s brother, Edward, followed in September to find out what had happened to the party.
Working from information provided by a group of hunters he and his party found the remains of four men, their hands tied to poles in the centre of a cleared area.
However it would be two more years until the remains of Thomas Grindell and his party were found, bones identified by
handwritten letters that found nearby.
Today the island is an inhabited nature preserve, though occasionally used by smugglers.
Gaming potential. A relatively remote island, though also close enough to Mexico and the US West coats, complete with dangerous life and potential cannibals? The perfect site for s Secret Base. Alternatively something weird to turn up there, an alien seed pod, crashed starship or Silurian hibernation chamber
7. Palmyra Island
Palmyra is a small American possession in the Pacific, an uninhabited atoll. It's very much the quintessential stereotype 'desert island' complete with palm and coconut trees. It's also got a few interesting incidents in it's history; use as a US Navy base during WW2, an observation site for nuclear weapon tests, a double murder (in 1974) and supposed pirate treasure (the motive for the murders)
In 1816 a Spanish pirate ship, the Esperanza,was involved a battle near Palmyra. Supposedly the surviving crew lived for a year there and buried a horde gold and silver plundered from Inca temples in Peru, before building rafts arnd setting off.
And what else might have been in that looted treasure beyond more gold and gems?
During it's WW2 use as a naval airbase the island was briefly shelled by a Japanese submarine; at least one patrol aircraft disappeared shortly after take-of with no remains or wreckage ever found. Since then there have been a number of maroonings and disappearances of boats near Palmyra.
Of course it's current status as a nature preserve could be cover for anything, just like the 'rat extermination' could have been cover for removing some far stranger and more dangerous alien life. Just what is going on there? Someone should investigate...
7. Bouvet Island
Another Norwegian posession, though this one is thousands of kilometres from Norway proper, Bouvet Island is a small (~200km2) uninhabited volcanic island in the South Atlantic Ocean. It's the most remote island in the world, about 2,600 kilometres south-southwest of the South Africa coast and about 1,750 kilometres from the coast of Antarctica.
There is little vegetation, lots of birds and also seals. The highest point is a central plateau about 750m high.
It was first explored by Norwegians from the survey ship Norvegia in 1927 and pretty much ignored until the South Africans tried to establish a weather station. On 2 April 1964 a party of explorers were dropped by helicopter (days of very high winds made even helicopter landings impossible) and found a ship's lifeboat and other detritus on the island but no signs of human habitation or remains. In 1966 when a longer biological survey was carried out the lifeboat was gone.
Game use. What happened to leave a lifeboat on the island and why were there no signs of survivors? And if there was a ship lost why was no trace found? And what was a ship doing there anyway as Bouvet is nowhere near regular sea-lanes. Was someone (Mad Scientists/Soviet spies perhaps) Up To Something?
The film Alien vs. Predator was set here.
8. Canvey island.
And now something rather different. Canvey is an island of about 18km² off the southern coats of Essex in the estuary of the river Thames, about 50km from London. Over the years (and there have been many of them, there were traces of Roman settlement found) it's been used for many purposes, legal and otherwise.
It's been the venue for illegal bare-knuckle boxing matches, a haunt of smugglers, a popular seaside resort (1910-), the home of one of Britain's largest explosives plants (George Kynoch & Co. at Shell Creek, 1889-1919) and later a major petrochemical site (1936-) complete with attempted terrorist attack.
There's also the 'Canvey Island Monster' which was washed up in the flood of 1953; allegedly possessing limbs
Kynoch’s
Hotel was built on the island by the company (opened 1903) to house it's senior staff at a safe distance both from the explosives and their families. Local stories suggest that the hotel had links to the Hell Fire Club whose membership was reported to have indulged in all sorts of immoral acts.
One of the most fascinating aspects of the island's history is Hole Haven creek, once used for storing thousands of tonnes of dynamite. Due to the Explosives Act of 1875 and the Port of London regulations dynamite and other explosives could not be stored or loaded within London, so ships would collect it from the isolated Hole Haven where hulks (permanently moored barges) were used to store dynamite and later other materials. Depending on the era from six to fifteen hulks stored hundreds of tonnes of explosives.
In 1882 a barge (the George and Valentine) sank in Hole Haven while carrying more than two thousand cases of
dynamite, being trans-shipped from Nobel’s Explosives Company in Ardeer in Scotland. The matter was raised in the House of Commons on a number of occasions, mainly pertaining to the poor security. At night only one watchman (unarmed) was onboard each boat and they were out of sight of the local Coastguards.
Most histories of the island don't mention experiments into creating portals to other dimensions by use of alien hyper-geometries (and the resulting effects on local space-time), crashed alien starships, a Silurian hibernation colony or it's use as a base for a time travelling submarine.
Thoughts? Comments? Ideas?
1. Bear Island.
Actually there are more than twenty 'Bear islands' around the world.We start at the top of the world, at 74°31' N 19°01' E, Bear Island is the southernmost of the Svalbard islands and is currently uninhabited. In fact through most of it's known history (which stated in 1596) it's been uninhabited with few natural resources (coal has been sporadically mined) but an interesting strategic position in the Barents Sea. This led to disputes between Russia and Germany (and Norway) before the First World War but the island was officially unclaimed until 1920 when it became Norwegian.
Twenty years later the strategic position became even more important as the convoys to Murmansk and other Soviet ports passed nearby. Nazi Germany established weather stations and facilities to monitor radio traffic from Allied convoys and the waters around the island became a battleground on many occasions as German aircraft and submarines (plus occasional surface warships) attacked the convoys.
I was introduced to the island by Alistair MacLean's novel which features a film company operating on the island ostensibly filming a WW2 movie, but with several plots in the background featuring Nazi gold. Now historically there were no submarine bases there, but in the Whoniverse it would have been a test sites for any Nazi Mad Science, alien weapons, inter-dimensional portals, flying saucers or time machines could all have been tested there. And might still be there, waiting for someone to rediscover them, perhaps adding a little international rivalry (in the mode of MacLean's Ice Station Zebra) to the mix.
I'll leave the last comment to the fictional Captain Imrie.
'I wonder what Bear Island means to you people,’ he went on. ‘Nothing, I suppose, why should it? It’s just a name, Bear Island, just a name. Like the Isle of Wight or what’s yon place in America, Coney Island: just a name.
But for people like Mr Stokes here and myself and thousands of others it’s a wee bit more than that. It was a kind of turning-point, a dividing point in our lives, what those geography or geology fellows would call a watershed: when we came to know the name we knew that no name had ever meant so much to us before—and no name would ever mean so much again. And we knew that nothing would ever be the same again.
Bear Island was the place where boys grew up, just over the night, as it were: Bear Island was the place where middle-aged men like myself grew old.’ This was a different Captain Imrie speaking now, quietly reminiscent, sad without bitterness, and the captive audience was now voluntarily so, no longer glancing longingly at the saloon exits.
‘We called it “the Gate”,’ he went on. ‘The gate to the Barents Sea and the White Sea and those places in Russia where we took those convoys through all the long years of the war, all those long years ago. If you
passed the Gate and came back again, you were a lucky man: if you did it half-a-dozen times you’d used up all your luck for a lifetime.
But for people like Mr Stokes here and myself and thousands of others it’s a wee bit more than that. It was a kind of turning-point, a dividing point in our lives, what those geography or geology fellows would call a watershed: when we came to know the name we knew that no name had ever meant so much to us before—and no name would ever mean so much again. And we knew that nothing would ever be the same again.
Bear Island was the place where boys grew up, just over the night, as it were: Bear Island was the place where middle-aged men like myself grew old.’ This was a different Captain Imrie speaking now, quietly reminiscent, sad without bitterness, and the captive audience was now voluntarily so, no longer glancing longingly at the saloon exits.
‘We called it “the Gate”,’ he went on. ‘The gate to the Barents Sea and the White Sea and those places in Russia where we took those convoys through all the long years of the war, all those long years ago. If you
passed the Gate and came back again, you were a lucky man: if you did it half-a-dozen times you’d used up all your luck for a lifetime.
2. Svalbard
Svalbard is technically a region rather than a specific island, and includes Bear Island. However the rest of the area is actually inhabited by humans (and polar bears) so I've separated it.
This remote and craggy Norwegian territory is surprisingly well populated, with a mix of scientists, miners and tourists, and has all the facilities expected in an isolated settlement (schools, hospital, university, newspaper et cetera).
Tourists flock there annually to watch the majestic polar bears in their natural habitat, and occasionally be killed by them. Killing bears for sport is illegal but it is mandatory for travellers outside of settlement to be armed in case of bear
attack.
Like Bear Island Svalbard experiences the constant sunlight of the Arctic summer; from 20 April 20 to 23 August (approximately), the sun never sets over Svalbard. A phenomenon which can play havoc with people's bodily clocks.
Possible adventures on Svalbard include the classic Doctor Who motif of something weird being found/dug up and the party being called in to examine it (spaceship/psionic crystal/alien hand/gelatinous blob et cetera). During the UNIT era this can have some interesting complications due to the Soviet (and later Russian) presence. Otherwise it's a good place for secret research (though probably not in reality due to the small community) which goes horribly wrong. Encounters with officious Norwegian bureaucrats, retired Soviet spies, scientists with something to hide and of course polar bears (standard or alien possessed/cybernetically enhanced/maddened by alien chemicals/mind controlled).
The recent television series Fortitude is set on Svalbard and could be a useful basis for an adventure.
3. Gruinard Island
Not quite as cold and bleak as the two previous islands there's a rather different reason to avoid this Scottish island; actual mad science went on here in the form of British experiments with anthrax.
In 1942 the British government was interested in the use of anthrax as a biological weapon and needed somewhere suitably isolated to carry out tests, the uninhabited small island of Gruinard just off the west coast of Scotland was requisitioned.
Sheep and goats were brought to the island and bombs loaded with spores of a particularly nasty strain of anthrax detonated to test the effects. It was determined that the soil would remain contaminated with anthrax spores for decades and the island was quarantined, visited only by occasional teams from the British CBW facility a Porton Down. Sporadic attempts were made at decontamination but these weren't pursued until the mid 1980s. During the war corpses and remains of the test animals washed ashore and caused a minor outbreak of anthrax.
In 1982 a group using the name 'Operation Dark Harvest' removed soil from the island and sent it to Porton Down and to the UK Conservative party (then in power) conference demanding the island be decontaminated. In 1986 efforts began and about 300 tonnes of formaldehyde was mixed with seawater and sprayed on the island, with some soil from anthrax 'hot spots' removed and cleansed by heating to destroy spores. in 1990 the process was complete
and the island declared safe. It is currently being considered as a site for storage of radioactive waste.
Gaming potential. Well there's the classic trope of the players arriving accidentally and unknowingly on the island and are exposed as they blunder around (did anyone pack doxycycline?). Of course maybe the island was used for testing something worse than anthrax and the contamination story just a ruse. Or was something found there that needed to be kept quite?
4. Surtsey.
Unlike Sarah Anne island (which disappeared) Surtsey is an example of an appearing island, the product of volcanic activity of the coast of Iceland. Starting in 1963 and lasting until 1967 millions of tonnes of molten rock were released underwater to form the small (originally 2.8km2 now about 1.4km2). Within a few years plant life arrived, then insects, birds and seals. Now there are a few bushes, gull colonies and earthworms. This has been of great interest to naturalists who've extensvely studied the creation of a new ecosystem. There is no pennant settlement, just a prefabricated cabin and strict rules on not contaminating the island.
Gaming uses. A new island isn't just a site for research. It could have a useful strategic location during the Cold War, leading to conflict over ownership. Then there's the volcanic eruption that formed Surtsey, was it really a natural phenomenom? Or did someone trigger it, and why? Was an alien/Silurian/Mad Scientist attempting to create an island base?
<This would be where Eilean Mòr would go but I'm keeping the mystery of Flannan lighthouse for another time>
5. Tiburón Island
Tiburón Island is the largest island in Mexico, around 1,200km², on the eastern short of the Gulf of California. It’s not a particularly pleasant place, barren, hot and with numerous venomous animals, as well as being home to an isolated group of humans called the Seri who have long been labeled as cannibals. However it's also also long been reputed to
contain untold riches and precious metals.
This lead to the Tiburón Island Tragedy of 1905 where four American prospectors died on the island. Led by Thomas Grindell they set out on 10 June 10th, promising to be back by the end of July. They never returned. Grindell’s brother, Edward, followed in September to find out what had happened to the party.
Working from information provided by a group of hunters he and his party found the remains of four men, their hands tied to poles in the centre of a cleared area.
- The Seri were believed to tie their captives to stakes or driftwood, cutting them apart little by little, eating the pieces, and watching them die.
However it would be two more years until the remains of Thomas Grindell and his party were found, bones identified by
handwritten letters that found nearby.
Today the island is an inhabited nature preserve, though occasionally used by smugglers.
Gaming potential. A relatively remote island, though also close enough to Mexico and the US West coats, complete with dangerous life and potential cannibals? The perfect site for s Secret Base. Alternatively something weird to turn up there, an alien seed pod, crashed starship or Silurian hibernation chamber
7. Palmyra Island
Palmyra is a small American possession in the Pacific, an uninhabited atoll. It's very much the quintessential stereotype 'desert island' complete with palm and coconut trees. It's also got a few interesting incidents in it's history; use as a US Navy base during WW2, an observation site for nuclear weapon tests, a double murder (in 1974) and supposed pirate treasure (the motive for the murders)
In 1816 a Spanish pirate ship, the Esperanza,was involved a battle near Palmyra. Supposedly the surviving crew lived for a year there and buried a horde gold and silver plundered from Inca temples in Peru, before building rafts arnd setting off.
And what else might have been in that looted treasure beyond more gold and gems?
During it's WW2 use as a naval airbase the island was briefly shelled by a Japanese submarine; at least one patrol aircraft disappeared shortly after take-of with no remains or wreckage ever found. Since then there have been a number of maroonings and disappearances of boats near Palmyra.
Of course it's current status as a nature preserve could be cover for anything, just like the 'rat extermination' could have been cover for removing some far stranger and more dangerous alien life. Just what is going on there? Someone should investigate...
- And bring their own food. Most fish around the atoll are contaminated with poisonous algae (ciguatera) and the waters teem with aggressive gray and blacktip reef sharks.
7. Bouvet Island
Another Norwegian posession, though this one is thousands of kilometres from Norway proper, Bouvet Island is a small (~200km2) uninhabited volcanic island in the South Atlantic Ocean. It's the most remote island in the world, about 2,600 kilometres south-southwest of the South Africa coast and about 1,750 kilometres from the coast of Antarctica.
There is little vegetation, lots of birds and also seals. The highest point is a central plateau about 750m high.
It was first explored by Norwegians from the survey ship Norvegia in 1927 and pretty much ignored until the South Africans tried to establish a weather station. On 2 April 1964 a party of explorers were dropped by helicopter (days of very high winds made even helicopter landings impossible) and found a ship's lifeboat and other detritus on the island but no signs of human habitation or remains. In 1966 when a longer biological survey was carried out the lifeboat was gone.
Game use. What happened to leave a lifeboat on the island and why were there no signs of survivors? And if there was a ship lost why was no trace found? And what was a ship doing there anyway as Bouvet is nowhere near regular sea-lanes. Was someone (Mad Scientists/Soviet spies perhaps) Up To Something?
The film Alien vs. Predator was set here.
8. Canvey island.
And now something rather different. Canvey is an island of about 18km² off the southern coats of Essex in the estuary of the river Thames, about 50km from London. Over the years (and there have been many of them, there were traces of Roman settlement found) it's been used for many purposes, legal and otherwise.
It's been the venue for illegal bare-knuckle boxing matches, a haunt of smugglers, a popular seaside resort (1910-), the home of one of Britain's largest explosives plants (George Kynoch & Co. at Shell Creek, 1889-1919) and later a major petrochemical site (1936-) complete with attempted terrorist attack.
There's also the 'Canvey Island Monster' which was washed up in the flood of 1953; allegedly possessing limbs
Kynoch’s
Hotel was built on the island by the company (opened 1903) to house it's senior staff at a safe distance both from the explosives and their families. Local stories suggest that the hotel had links to the Hell Fire Club whose membership was reported to have indulged in all sorts of immoral acts.
- Possibly including (in a CoC game) interbreeding with Deep Ones or experiments in summoning horrors.
One of the most fascinating aspects of the island's history is Hole Haven creek, once used for storing thousands of tonnes of dynamite. Due to the Explosives Act of 1875 and the Port of London regulations dynamite and other explosives could not be stored or loaded within London, so ships would collect it from the isolated Hole Haven where hulks (permanently moored barges) were used to store dynamite and later other materials. Depending on the era from six to fifteen hulks stored hundreds of tonnes of explosives.
- Security was notably poor, something that 's worth bearing in mind for a game set in the Victorian or Edwardian periods where a supply of dynamite is needed. By whomever....
In 1882 a barge (the George and Valentine) sank in Hole Haven while carrying more than two thousand cases of
dynamite, being trans-shipped from Nobel’s Explosives Company in Ardeer in Scotland. The matter was raised in the House of Commons on a number of occasions, mainly pertaining to the poor security. At night only one watchman (unarmed) was onboard each boat and they were out of sight of the local Coastguards.
Most histories of the island don't mention experiments into creating portals to other dimensions by use of alien hyper-geometries (and the resulting effects on local space-time), crashed alien starships, a Silurian hibernation colony or it's use as a base for a time travelling submarine.
Thoughts? Comments? Ideas?
