NASA Uncovers Cold War Base As Greenland Debates Skies

On a brisk morning in April 2024, NASA scientist Chad Greene peered at radar images from a routine flight over the Greenland Ice Sheet and stumbled upon something extraordinary. Tucked 100 feet beneath the ice, the distinctive shapes of tunnels and structures emerged—remnants of Camp Century, a long-forgotten relic of the Cold War era. This accidental discovery, confirmed by NASA’s Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle Synthetic Aperture Radar (UAVSAR), has reignited interest in Greenland’s hidden past and present, revealing not only an abandoned U.S. military base but also the complex geopolitics and economic debates swirling above and below the island’s vast, icy expanse. Camp Century, often called "the city under the ice," was secretly constructed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers between June 1959 and October 1960. According to Interesting Engineering, the base comprised 21 underground tunnels stretching nearly 9,800 feet. The logistics were mind-boggling: 6,000 tons of material were hauled across the ice, sometimes at a glacial pace of two miles per hour, to build what was both a scientific outpost and, more covertly, a potential nuclear missile hub. Officially, Camp Century was a hub for scientific research. Army engineers dug trenches—one memorable passageway dubbed "Main Street" stretched 1,000 feet—before building wooden and steel structures within the snow and ice. The base was powered by one of the world’s first PM-2 medium-power nuclear reactors, a technological marvel at the time. During its brief operational life, scientists at Camp Century made significant geological discoveries, including pioneering studies of ice cores and soil that revealed Greenland’s ancient, forested past. But as The Guardian and the National Museum of Nuclear Science and History have since revealed, this scientific mission was a cover for a grander, more secretive plan: Project Iceworm. Project Iceworm envisioned a network of 52,000 square miles of tunnels beneath the ice to house up to 600 ballistic missiles, with 60 launch centers manned by 11,000 soldiers. The aim was to create an undetectable missile platform in the heart of the Arctic, safe from Soviet eyes. However, as the realities of Arctic engineering set in—temperatures could plunge to -70 degrees Fahrenheit, winds howled at 125 miles per hour, and the ice itself was far from stable—the plan unraveled. By 1967, Camp Century was decommissioned, abandoned, and left to be swallowed by the shifting ice. The Danish Institute of International Affairs would later publicize the nuclear ambitions behind the base in 1997. Yet, Camp Century’s legacy is more than just a Cold War curiosity. The nuclear reactor that powered the base for 33 months produced more than 47,000 gallons of nuclear waste, much of which remains entombed beneath the ice. When the base was shut down, the reactor was removed, but the waste was not. "They thought it would never be exposed," said William Colgan, a climate and glacier scientist at Toronto’s York University, in an interview with The Guardian. "Back then, in the ‘60s, the term global warming had not even been coined. But the climate is changing, and the question now is whether what’s down there is going to stay down there." Experts project that by 2090, melting ice could begin to uncover the hazardous remnants, raising environmental and political concerns for the future. While history lies buried below, another story unfolds in Greenland’s skies. On any given day, squadrons of jetliners—KLM from Tokyo to Amsterdam, Lufthansa from Frankfurt to Vancouver, Qatar Airways from Doha to Atlanta—crisscross the island’s airspace, following polar routes that link distant corners of the globe. Yet, for all the international traffic overhead, Greenland itself has little say in who controls or profits from its airspace. Since 1956, international agreements have placed Greenland’s high-altitude airspace under the control of Canada and Iceland. Denmark, which governs Greenland as an autonomous territory, retains authority only up to 19,500 feet. Above that, it’s Reykjavik and Gander that call the shots. NAV Canada, which oversees Canadian civilian airspace, charges a flat fee of about $210 per transatlantic flight, while Iceland’s charges can reach twice that. None of these fees are passed on to Denmark or Greenland. "We are losing revenues that we are entitled to get and that could benefit our economic independence," said Vittus Qujaukitsoq, a Greenlandic politician who has served as Minister of Finance, Interior, and Foreign Affairs. He estimates that controlling its own airspace could bring in $30 million to $40 million a year—money that, alongside seafood revenues, could replace the $850 million Denmark currently provides Greenland in annual block grants. For Greenland, regaining control of its airspace is about more than just money. It’s a question of sovereignty and self-determination. "Against our will, [we are] losing revenue that we are entitled to," Qujaukitsoq told The Globe and Mail. But the path to independence is complicated. Modern air traffic control over the North Atlantic relies on state-of-the-art satellite technology, much of it developed by NAV Canada and Isavia (Iceland’s air navigation service provider). These systems have made air travel more efficient, shrinking the protected airspace around each aircraft by nearly 90 percent and enabling airlines to save thousands of dollars in fuel per flight. According to John Crichton, former president of NAV Canada, only about 10 percent of transatlantic flights actually cross Greenland, and the current arrangement is designed to cover costs, not generate profit. “If Denmark wanted to take that airspace itself and provide the control service, they could,” Crichton said. “It’s all technically possible. Whether or not it would make any sense economically, that’s another matter. I suspect it wouldn’t.” The infrastructure investment needed to build Greenland’s own air traffic control capacity would be significant, and existing providers would likely resist any change. Still, as Thorgeir Pálsson, former head of Isavia, observed, "It is very understandable why Greenland would be interested in asserting control over its own airspace. If they are well-paying jobs, they are of course valuable to society. It is a matter of economic activity." Meanwhile, the ravens of Nuuk come and go as they please, but any aircraft approaching the capital must answer to Danish authorities, with state-owned Naviair in charge of local air traffic control. For now, the skies above Greenland remain a crossroads of international interests, just as the ice below preserves the secrets—and the hazards—of a turbulent past. Greenland, it seems, is caught between worlds: a land where Cold War ghosts linger beneath the ice and modern jets streak overhead, carrying the promise and peril of global connection. As the island contemplates its future—both in terms of environmental risk and economic sovereignty—the choices made now may determine whether what lies below, and what soars above, can finally belong to Greenland itself.