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25-494: Owing to the harshness of the climate the East Siberian Lowland is largely unpopulated. Inhabited centers are small and widely scattered. Andryushkino , Argakhtakh , Chokurdakh , Nizhneyansk , Olenegorsk , Russkoye Ustye , Srednekolymsk , and Zyryanka are among the few towns in the area. The East Siberian Lowland is an extensive region located in the far north-east of Siberia . It is roughly triangular in shape and

50-468: A famous anthology about life in Gulag camps by Varlam Shalamov , The Kolyma Tales . After the camps were closed, state subsidies , local industries and communication dwindled to almost nothing. Many people have migrated, but those who remain in the area make a living by fishing and hunting. In small fishing settlements, fish are sometimes stored in caves carved from permafrost . The last Americans to visit

75-559: A low of 30.6 m /s (1,080 cu ft/s) in April 1979. The main tributaries of the Kolyma are, from source to mouth: In the last 75-kilometre (47 mi) stretch, the Kolyma divides into two large branches. There are many islands at the mouth of the Kolyma before it meets the East Siberian sea. The main ones are: In 1640 Dimitry Zyryan (also called Yarilo or Yerilo) went overland to

100-599: Is a river in northeastern Siberia , whose basin covers parts of the Sakha Republic , Chukotka Autonomous Okrug , and Magadan Oblast of Russia . The Kolyma is frozen to depths of several metres for about 250 days each year, becoming free of ice only in early June, until October. The Kolyma begins at the confluence of the Kulu and the Ayan-Yuryakh (Kolyma a natural continuation of Ayan-Yuryakh). The confluence happens in

125-617: Is about 1,300 kilometres (810 mi) from east to west and 1,100 kilometres (680 mi) from north to south, gradually rising and narrowing southwards, deeper into the continent. Except for a small section at the southern end the lowland region lies almost wholly north of the Polar Circle . The lowland includes the Yana-Indigirka , Kolyma and Aby lowlands, vast alluvial plains , swampy and dotted with thousands of lakes. These smaller lowland units are limited by residual ridges which break

150-637: Is considered an inaccessible place, for it has no regular communication with the outside world. In winter it can be reached by winter road, but in summer only via the river or by helicopter. The nearest settlement is Chersky , located 450 kilometers (280 mi) away to the southeast, also in the Lower Kolyma District . This Sakha Republic location article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Kolyma River The Kolyma ( Russian : Колыма , IPA: [kəlɨˈma] ; Yakut : Халыма , romanized:  Xalıma )

175-416: Is −32 °C (−26 °F) by the seashore and −36 °C (−33 °F) inland. In July the average temperature reaches 0 °C (32 °F) by the seashore, but stays a chilly −12 °C (10 °F) in the inland zone. Most of the lowland is covered by tundra . Only at the southern end in the upper Kolyma River basin there is a region where larch taiga can grow. There are wild reindeer herds in

200-619: The Alazeya Plateau , and to the east by the western end of the ranges of the Anadyr and the Yukaghir Highlands . The lowlands are crossed by slowly meandering rivers flowing mostly northwards. The main ones are the Yana , Indigirka and Kolyma and their tributaries, as well as the smaller Omoloy , Alazeya , Sundrun and Khroma rivers. Except for the very large ones, most of the rivers of

225-806: The Arctic Ocean , the Laptev Sea and the East Siberian Sea . It includes the large New Siberian Islands and the smaller Medvezhy Islands , which form a continuum with the Eastern Siberian continental lowland region. To the west, south and southwest the lowland is limited by the East Siberian Mountains , including the Verkhoyansk Range , the Chersky Range and their foothills, as well as by

250-698: The Indigirka . In 1641 he sailed down the Indigirka, went east and up the Alazeya . Here they heard of the Kolyma and met Chukchis for the first time. In 1643 he returned to the Indigirka, sent his yasak (tribute) to Yakutsk and went back to the Alazeya. In 1645 he returned to the Lena where he met a party and learned that he had been appointed prikazchik (land administrator) of the Kolyma. He returned east and died in early 1646. In

275-639: The Okhotsk-Kolyma Upland (Охотско-Колымское нагорье), which lies within the watershed that separates the Kolyma basin and the basins of rivers flowing into the Sea of Okhotsk . Kolyma flows across the Upper Kolyma Highlands roughly southwards in its upper course. Leaving the mountainous areas it flows roughly northwards across the Kolyma Lowland , a vast plain dotted with thousands of lakes, part of

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300-495: The Siberian crane , Brent goose , Bewick's swan and the spectacled eider . Andryushkino Andryushkino ( Russian : Андрюшкино ; Yakut : Андрюшкино ) is a rural locality (a selo ), the only inhabited settlement and the administrative center of Rural National Yukagir Settlement of "Olerinsky Suktul" of Nizhnekolymsky District in the Sakha Republic , Russia , located 450 kilometers (280 mi) from Chersky ,

325-554: The Sundrun River that have a yearly migration pattern. The total reindeer population of the East Siberian Lowland, however, is small when compared with other areas, such as the Canadian Arctic . Rivers and lakes are abundant in fish, such as Arctic char (golets) , Siberian vendace , chir , East Siberian grayling , muksun , nelma and omul . In the summer the wetlands are home to large populations of migratory birds, including

350-651: The Kolyma during the Soviet era, before perestroika , were the crew of the sailing schooner Nanuk in August 1929, whose visit was captured in a film taken by the Nanuk owner's 18-year-old daughter, Marion Swenson. The first two Americans to visit the Kolyma after the Nanuk' s visit were writer Wallace Kaufman and journalist Rebecca Clay, who traveled by cutter from Ziryanka to Green Cape in August 1991. Kaufman and his daughter Sylvan and CPA Letty Collins Magdanz also travelled part of

375-582: The Kolyma in August 1992, the first American visitors since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Both trips were arranged by North-East Scientific and Industrial Center: Ecocenter to try out an ecotourism route which was found to be impractical. In February 2012, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reported that scientists had grown plants from 30,000-year-old Silene stenophylla fruit, which

400-556: The administrative center of the district. Its population as of the 2010 Census was 741, of whom 369 were male and 372 female, down from 845 recorded during the 2002 Census . Andryushkino is located on the right bank of the Alazeya , 70 kilometers (43 mi) to the SSE of the eastern end of the Suor Uyata range and 60 kilometers (37 mi) to the SSW of Kisilyakh-Tas mountain. Andryushkino

425-566: The basin of the Kolyma (among other Far-eastern Siberian rivers) on behalf of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Barr, 1980). During one year and two days the expedition covered 25,000 kilometres (16,000 mi), of which 4,200 kilometres (2,600 mi) were up rivers, carrying out geodesic surveys en route. The Kolyma is known for its Gulag labour camps and gold mining , both of which have been extensively documented since Joseph Stalin –era Soviet archives opened. The river gives its title to

450-589: The basin of the present-day Yana River and the upper reaches of the Indigirka in the Permian period. The Verkhoyansk Sea was located at the eastern edge of the Siberian Craton . As centuries went by, most of the area became gradually filled with the alluvial deposits of modern rivers. The climate prevailing in the lowland is subarctic and severe, characterized by long, very cold winters. The average temperature in January

475-509: The electricity to the region including Magadan. the Kolyma dam is an earthen dam some 150 ft high. Air circulation tubes carry frigid winter air into the core of the dam where frozen earth stabilizes the structure. Kolyma Ges. said it was the largest dam ever built in a permafrost region. In 1992 a new hydropower plant was under construction at Ust-Srednekan, the Ust-Srednekan Hydroelectric Plant . Larch forests cleared for

500-510: The generally flat relief, including the Kyundyulyun , Polousny Range , Ulakhan-Sis , Kondakov Plateau and Suor Uyata , as well as by isolated hills rising from the tundra, such as the Kisilyakh-Tas by the Alazeya . Most of the kigilyakhs of Yakutia are found in these elevated areas of the East Siberian Lowland. To the north the East Siberian Lowland is bound by shallow marginal seas of

525-550: The greater East Siberian Lowland . The river empties into the Kolyma Gulf of the East Siberian Sea , a division of the Arctic Ocean . The Kolyma is 2,129 kilometres (1,323 mi) long. The area of its basin is 647,000 square kilometres (250,000 sq mi). The average discharge at Kolymskoye is 3,254 m /s (114,900 cu ft/s), with a high of 26,201 m /s (925,300 cu ft/s) reported in June 1985, and

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550-569: The lowland freeze to the bottom in the winter. Continuous permafrost is prevalent in the East Siberian Lowlands, and permafrost-related formations such as alas thermokarst depressions and baydzharakh mounds are common throughout the region. Geologically the lowland is mainly composed of sediments of marine origin. these date back to the time when the area was occupied by the Verkhoyansk Sea , an ancient sea which took up most of

575-524: The winter of 1641–42 Mikhail Stadukhin , accompanied by Semyon Dezhnyov , went overland to the upper Indigirka. He spent the next winter there, built boats and sailed down the Indigirka and east to the Alazeya where he met Zyryan. Zyryan and Dezhnyov stayed at the Alazeya, while Stadukhin went east, reaching the Kolyma in the summer of 1644. They built a zimovye (winter cabin), probably at Srednekolymsk , and returned to Yakutsk in late 1645. In 1892–94 Baron Eduard Von Toll carried out geological surveys in

600-441: Was started in the 1980s by Kolyma Gestroi and both the plant and the town of Sinegorye were built under the supervision of chief engineer Oleg Kogadovski. The town included an olympic sized swimming pool, an underground rifle range, and many amenities absent in most other small Russian towns. Kogadovski said that in order to attract and employ good talent in such a remote place, the town had to be exceptional. The dam provides most of

625-467: Was stored in squirrel burrows near the banks of the Kolyma river and preserved in permafrost. Settlements at the Kolyma river include (listed downstream) Sinegorye , Debin , Ust-Srednekan , Seymchan , Zyryanka , Srednekolymsk and Chersky . The Kolyma Hydroelectric Station is a hydropower plant at Sinegorye , downstream from the Kolyma Reservoir in the upper part of the river. The plant

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