For the official launch in Paris at Palais de la découverte on 1st of March, the french postal administration, in connection with the french branch of the International Association for Polar Philately, "A.I.Phi.Pol", will open a special postal station with a special cancellation and postal stationary (pre-stamped envelope) especially designed for this historic day. The special postal station will be open in the morning for the conference attenders and in the afternoon for the public. The "A.I.Phi.Pol" have also arranged to have a small quantity of booklets available containing IPY stamps from the eight arctic countries. The booklets will be available on the opening day at the face value. To reserve a booklet, please email {encode=" This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it " title="aiph...

In many places on this web site you will find reference to 'IPY launch' and launch events. Many of us work on an IPY Opening Ceremony scheduled for 1 March 2007. But, if you follow this blog, you have read reports from the vessel Tara, frozen into Arctic sea ice, and from Polarstern, already working near Antarctica in the southern ocean. You might have noticed in recent news and blogs that a Chilean and US expedition, on the Swedish vessel Oden, departed a ...

Countries around the world are issuing special stamps to herald the arrival of International Polar Year 2007-2008. The initiative is being spearheaded by eight Arctic nations — the United States, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. In addition to the individual releases, a booklet of souvenir sheets will be issued containing all eight sets. The U.S. Postal Service will issue a souvenir sheet of two 84-cent international letter rate stamps which will also be issued as a pane of 20 under the title ‘Polar Lights’. In 1958, the United States issued a three-cent stamp to commemorate the International Geophysical Year 1957-58. ...