Barents Sea the Norwegian Sea to the west, and the archipelagos of Svalbard to the northwest, Franz Josef Land to the northeast and Novaya Zemlya to the east. The islands of Novaya Zemlya, an extension of the northern end of the Ural Mountains, separate the Barents Sea from the Kara Sea. Despite being part of the Arctic Ocean, the Barents Sea has been characterized as "turning into the Atlantic" because of its status as "the Arctic warming hot spot." Hydrologic changes due to global warming have led to a reduction in sea ice and in stratification of the water column, which could
North Pole a team of Afanasy Makovnev, Vladimir Obikhod, Alexey Shkrabkin, Andrey Vankov, Sergey Isayev and Nikolay Kozlov on two custom-built 6 x 6 low-pressure-tire ATVs — Yemelya-3 and Yemelya-4,— started from Golomyanny Island (the Severnaya Zemlya Archipelago) to the North Pole across drifting ice of the Arctic Ocean. The vehicles reached the Pole on 6 April and then continued to the Canadian coast. The coast was reached on 30 April 2013 (83°08N, 075°59W Ward Hant Island), and on 5 May 2013 the expedition finished in Resolute Bay, NU. The way between the Russian borderland (Machtovyi Island of the Severnaya Zemlya Archipelago,