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Comment by sdfjkl | Hacker News Reader

Nonsense. The airport has no need of additional procedures because it is gatewayed by Norway (it's not an international airport).

If you arrive there by boat, things look well different:

> Visiting yachts must obtain a cruising permit before arrival and make arrangements for special insurance to cover the possible cost of a search and rescue operation. Also compulsory is having a gun to protect the crew from possible attacks by polar bears, of which there have been several in recent years. Those who do not possess a gun can hire one locally. SAR insurance cover is also available locally but is probably much cheaper if it is arranged through one’s own insurance company or bank.

Source: https://www.noonsite.com/place/norway/svalbard-spitsbergen/l...

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Your quote really doesn't relate to TFA at all. "Open borders" is about immigration, whereas you're discussing insurance and self-protection requirements. Incidentally, a gun is virtually essential if you're going anywhere on Svalbard outside of built-up areas, whether you arrive by boat or not.

It doesn't restrict immigration based on nationality. It does restrict it based on a lot of other things, so it's not really open borders.

It is an international airport, when you fly from Oslo, you go through immigration and exit the Schengen area.

While the visa requirement of transiting through Norway probably limits most visitors, the article does mention there are charter flights from Moscow every other month that avoids this restriction.

It looks like it's about 4500 km from Longyearbyen to Istanbul, which seems like a charter flight could then really open up international access without regard to visas -- since Turkish Airlines flies to around 120 countries from Istanbul Atatürk Airport, which allows visa-free international transit¹.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Turkish_Airlines_desti...

I don't think this will happen since that charter would be insanely expensive, and it would be hard for large numbers of people who all can't easily get a Schengen visa to coordinate regularly to pay for it to happen at the same moment.

I think it would be a fun premise for a movie, at least.

¹ It might be challenging to convince the Turkish Airlines gate agents in all of the origin countries that the passengers, some of whom are not legally eligible to enter Turkey visa-free (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_policy_of_Turkey#/media/F...), are all planning to make an inter-airline transfer in Istanbul, although maybe they could all show some kind of boarding document for the charter.

I heard somewhere that in most if not all countries you don't need a visa to enter by boat. Maybe this is a truth with modifocation as well?

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