Novaya Zemlya and Belushya Guba : from desolate bomb test site to happier days

Norhern Siberia and Arctic Russia have been a cursed land for centuries - the 'Gulag' camps, the miserable native (Nenets) settlements, and soviet hell-like heavy industrial towns, were the territory's landmarks, along with the destruction of nature resources and environment, sometimes with heavy costs - like the building of railway lines through the unstable flooded tundra in the soviet era that took the lives of many thousands.

But in recent years things started running in a happier direction; I already gave notice here of some uplifted attractive towns in the siberian far-east, like Khabarovsk, Ussuriysk or Anadyr. This time I look upon Novaya Zemlya, a group of islands infamously known for the nuclear tests that took place there during the Cold War, but nowadays taking a turn to modern life with decent standards of living, as in the colourful newly-painted Belushya Guba, the main town. Slowly, the archipelago is opening to the world, still with many restrictions, but finally showing glorious natural territory, mostly unknown before.

Novaya Zemlya, the northeasternmost extreme of Europe

This achipelago lies between the Barents Sea and the Kara Sea.

Location:  70°30′ to 77°N, and 51°10′ to 70°E

Novaya Zemlya (New Land) is a large Russian landmass, with a total area of 83000 km2, located in the Arctic sea off the coast of Siberia. Those rugged Arctic islands have one of the most severe climates on Earth.

It is an archipelago that consists of two main islands, Severny and Yuzhny, separated by a narrow natural channel, the Matochkin strait, used for centuries to shorten a northeast passage through the Artic sea.

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In winter, an ice sheet covers the islands and the frozen sea around.

The archipelago is actually a northern extension of the Ural Mountains, from which derives its long, skinny shape.

Arctic tundra covers the southern island. The northern island, Severny, is covered by a permanent ice cap that feeds several glaciers, most of them running to the Barents sea.

Inostrantseva Glacier, a distinctive shape.

Thousands of years ago, all Novaya Zemlya was covered by a glacial ice sheet. As the ice sheet advanced over the islands, it scoured the bedrock below, leaving giant parallel striations and scrapes across the landscape.

 

Reflections of Severny coast, Barents sea

Detail of the northeastern coast.

 

Cape Zhelaniya, the extreme northeast of Novaya Zemlya and of Europe, at 76° 57′ N, 68° 34′ E.

A view of Matochkin strait.

The strait also separates the north arctic desert landscape from the southern tundra, where most inhabitants live.

The native population

Amazingly, there are over 2 700 people living in Novaya Zemlya, of which 2 600 live in the only major settlement, Belushya Guba.

Before the bomb test program, only the southern island was inhabited by a small number of Samoyedic people, the native population: about 50 to 300 nomadic Nenets who subsisted mainly on fishing, trapping, reindeer herding, polar bear and seal hunting.

Matochkin Shar's nenet comunity.

Seeing the strait, by Nenets artist Tyko Vylka

A lonely chapel on the ice, close to Matochkin strait.

History

The first visit from a west European was by Hugh Willoughby in 1553, and he met Russian ships from the already established hunting trade. Dutch explorer Willem Barentsz reached the west coast of Novaya Zemlya in 1594, and in a subsequent expedition of 1596 rounded the northern point and wintered on the northeast coast.

Entering 'Matochkin Shar' (strait).

While many expeditions reached the west coast, the east coast remained unvisited until a hunting and exploring expedition in 1760, led by Savva Loshkin, cruised north from Kara Strait to spend two winters here, returning the third year along the west coast to complete the first circumnavigation.

In July 1954, Novaya Zemlya was designated; a Test Site, and so remained during much of the Cold War. Sukhoy Nos peninsula (73.7° N,  54° E) was used in 1958–1961 and was the 1961 explosion site of the 100 megaton Tsar Bomba.

Sukhoy Nos Peninsula, on the east coast north of Matochkin strait, was the site of the Tsar bomba .

Just to the northeast of Belushya Guba is the major airport and air base, at Rogachevo, which receives scheduled flights from the mainland.

Rogachevo air base was founded in the 1950s as a staging base for long-range bombing missions. Novaya Zemlya was home to the most powerful nuclear explosion everrecorded: the 1961 detonation of the Tsar Bomba.

The bomb obliterated everything within a 55km range and broke windows 90km away, almost reaching the plane pilots 10 km above. To the south, Matochkin strait was under severe effects of the blast.

50 years on, the massive black scar left by the bomb can still be seen. At the centre of the scar lies this crater-shaped lake.

The surface of the island was levelled, and the rocks melted.

But somehow nature seems to have recovered:

A bear over Sukhoy Nos peninsula

The diversity of arctic flora in spring

For now, Novaya Zemlya remains mostly a military outpost at the edge of Europe, with restricted access to visitors.

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Next post: Belushya Guba, the main settlement

Winter in the Arctic, Summer in Antarctica

As the arctic prepares for some months of long dark night...

... in the extreme south arrives a short summer, not warm but as good as it gets.

This is the best time of the year in Antarctica, with luck you can even find some flowers !

Have a nice summer down there, people of the iced South!

Qikiqtarjuaq, Broughton Island, door to the Auyuittuq Park

Qikiqtarjuaq (meaning big island ) is located just north of the Arctic Circle and off the east coast of Baffin Island, in smaller Broughton Island (only 12 by 16 km).

A narrow strait of 3,5 Km separates the two islands, and at east Greenland is close by across Davis Strait.

The village is set in a glorious arctic scenery, in a large bay surrounded by mountains that in sunny days reflect on the quiet waters.

Population: ~520
Latitude 67° 33’ N,  Longitude 64° 01’ W

One of the more traditional communities in Nunavut, Qikiqtarjuaq is known for its traditional Inuit and modern clothing, including sealskin parkas and kamiit (skin boots).

Abundant wildlife and beautiful scenery attract visitors to Qikiqtarjuaq, often called ‘Qik’ for short.

In the 1800s, European whalers would crisscross the Davis Strait between Greenland and Baffin Island to trade goods with the local Inuit people.

Qikiqtarjuaq is also the ‘Iceberg and Diving Capital of Nunavut’. The community has several local certified divers available throughout the diving season.

A nine-room inn, the Tulugak Hotel

Sunset at Qikitarjuaq bay

More infos : here and here
 
Broughton Island

Some views :

Aerial view

The east coast,looking to Greenland across Davis strait

Cape Broughton also looking east

In spring landscape is decorated with artic flowering like these poppies.

AUYUITTUQ PARK

Qikiqtarjuaq is conveniently close to the northern boundary of the majestically mountainous Auyuittuq National Park in Baffin Island, a closer door to the park than the southern hamlet of  Pangnirtung.

Coordinates 66°32′N, 65°19′W

Auyuittuq National Park has amazing glaciers, waterfalls, sheer cliffs, semicircular valleys, flat-topped peaks like Mount Asgard or steep peaks like  Mount Thor:

Mount Asgard

Mount Thor, a famous steep cliff 1675 m high

‘Auyuittuq’ in Inuktitut language means ‘land that never melts.’ Established in 1976, this national park protects 19 089 square kilometres of pristine, glacier-scoured arctic terrain. The Inuit people have used this majestic land for thousands of years as a traditional travel corridor.

Auyuittuq Park deserves by itself a dedicated post here, I will publish it as soon as possible.

The Smoking Cliffs of Franklin Bay, just south of the Horton river mouth

In a recent post, I published an illustration of the Smoking Hills of Franklin Bay  as seen by british Captain Robert McClure in 1850, when he was exploring the coastline in search of the lost John Franklin expedition:

At the mouth of the river Horton, McClure sent a search party to investigate what appeared to be fire in what is now Franklin Bay. Thick columns of smoke were emerging from vents in the ground. The sailors returned with a sample of the smoldering rock, and when they set it down on McClure's desk it burned a hole in the wood.

 

Those Smoking Hills are located about 1 km south of the Beaufort Sea, a couple of miles south of where the Horton River brokes through the headland.

 

The odd rarity is easy to explain - deposits of lignite, carbon-rich shale, and pyrite rich in sulphur,  ignite spontaneously when the hills erode and the mineral veins are exposed to the air, producing a constant smoke.  

 

The Smoking Hills are very impressive. They are a long (60 km) stretch of cliffs and hills.

Franklin Bay ( 69°40′N, 125°30′ W ) is a large inlet in the Northwest Territories, Canada.

 

It is a southern arm of the Amundsen Gulf, on Beaufort Sea. Franklin Bay receives the Horton River, after meandering through the Smoking Hills on the east coast of Cape Bathurst. The river snakes sharply back and forth, creating a curved line parallel to the coast.

RIVER HORTON

 

The Horton starts from a small lake, goes through a wild canyon, then passes meandering at the back of the Smoking Hills and reaches the sea on the east side of Cape Bathurst, at Franklin Bay. There the Horton's mouth forms a  wide delta.

As the river approaches its mouth, it starts meandering through the tundra flatland.

The mouth is presently a delta in the east coast, into Franklin Bay; but some years ago the river's course was different.

The mouth was then 100 kilometres  further north on the west side of Cape Bathurst, until about 1800, when a meander eroded through.

This NASA satellite image shows the deactivated meanders, now filled with sea water, as the Horton suddenly carved his new mouth to the east. It's a rare anomaly of its kind.