Signs in Norway Show Black Polar Bears

NW Cable News ^ | 09/05/03 | Staff Writer

[bedolido]

OSLO, Norway (AP) -- Polar bears on Norway's Arctic Svalbard islands are changing color, at least on the signs that caution residents and visitors alike that the animals are both an attraction and a danger.

The old signs show black bears on a white background, even though most people know that the bears are in fact white.

So when residents of the islands, some 300 miles north of Norway's mainland, pointed out the error to visiting national highway department officials, they took it to heart.

The department's magazine, Vegen og Vi, said the officials immediately started on the paperwork needed to give Svalbard an exemption to standard warning sign colors of black on white and ordered new signs with white bears on a black background.

The new signs will soon be posted along the roughly 25 miles of rough road around Longyearbyen, the main town on the remote island.

Svalbard and the adjacent ice pack sustain a population of 2,000-3,000 bears, which can grow to 440- to 880-pounds.

The bears sometimes wander into settlements or try to break into cabins, so residents and tourists routinely carry high-powered rifles for protection.

Copyright 2003 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

[grammarman]

I think the signs are more correct than you think. The fur of a polar bear appears white. It is in reality transluscent. The skin of a polar bear is indeed black.

[Charles Henrickson]

"Hey! What about me?"

[T Minus Four]

The new warning signs showing a polar bear in a blizzard:

[CalvaryJohn]

I think you polar bear is eating marshmallows. Look real close.

[T Minus Four]

:-)

[Shooter 2.5]

It's a picture of a silhouetted bear which would be correct. Unless they decided to paint the entire sign a dark color to contrast the white bear.

This is better than the wrong colored American Bald Eagle as the post office logo or the deer crossing signs that show a deer with the antlers on backwards.

[swarthyguy]

Jesse's on the way, get the lutefisk ready.

[mtbopfuyn]

The fur of a polar bear appears white. It is in reality transluscent.

True.

[dighton]

[Robert A Cook PE]

I'm thinking of the stupidity of the immense beauracrazy (IN ALL GOVERNMENTS!) that demands a "one size fits all" LAW (in this case, about bear signs) that the liberals continue to demand imposing on our (previous working) health care.