The Kolyma ( Russian : Колыма , IPA: [kəlɨˈma] ; Yakut : Халыма , romanized: Xalıma ) is a river in northeastern Siberia , whose basin covers parts of the Sakha Republic , Chukotka Autonomous Okrug , and Magadan Oblast of Russia .
22-567: Kolyma Hydroelectric Station is located on the Kolyma River in the village of Sinegorye , Yagodninsky District , Magadan Oblast Russia . It has an installed power generation capacity of 900 MW . Kolyma HPP is the basis of the energy system of Magadan Oblast ; it produces about 95% of the electricity in the region. It is the upper stage of the Kolyma cascade, while the lower one ( Ust-Srednekan Hydroelectric Plant ) of 570 MW installed capacity
44-501: A hydroelectric power plant is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This article about a dam or floodgate in Asia is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Kolyma River 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
66-468: 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
88-639: A high of 26,201 m /s (925,300 cu ft/s) reported in June 1985, and 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
110-537: Is under construction. Construction began in 1974 and the first generator was commissioned in 1982, the last in 1994. Construction of the Kolyma HPP was carried out in the harsh climatic conditions in the zone of permafrost . At 134.5 m (441 ft), it is the highest earth filled dam in Russia. It is also the most powerful hydroelectric plant in the country with an underground power station . This article about
132-644: The Town of Srednekolymsk . As a municipal division , the Town of Srednekolymsk is incorporated within Srednekolymsky Municipal District as Srednekolymsk Urban Settlement . The town is largely reliant on farming of reindeer , hunting for pelts , and fishing. A ice free port in the summer allows for goods to be shipped up river The town is served by the Srednekolymsk Airport ( IATA : SEK ). In
154-657: The Ayan-Yuryakh (Kolyma a natural continuation of Ayan-Yuryakh). The confluence happens in 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
176-698: 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
198-665: The Kolyma Lowland , a vast plain dotted with thousands of lakes, part of 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
220-627: The Sakha Republic , Russia , located on the left bank of the Kolyma River , 1,485 kilometers (923 mi) northeast of Yakutsk , the capital of the republic. As of the 2010 Census , its population was 3,525. When the Russians arrived in the 1640s, they built three forts on the Kolyma: Nizhnekolymsk , Srednekolymsk, and Verkhnekolymsk (i.e., lower, middle, and upper Kolymsk). They were about three days sled journey apart. Nizhnekolymsk
242-651: 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
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#1733084521651264-582: 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
286-566: 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
308-509: 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
330-491: The reservoir were cut in winter when the trunks were frozen and easily snapped. The wood was sold for pulp. There are only a few bridges over the river, including at Ust-Srednekan , at Sinegorye and at Debin (which carries the Kolyma Highway ). Srednekolymsk Srednekolymsk ( Russian : Среднеколы́мск ; Yakut : Орто Халыма , Orto Xalıma ) is a town and the administrative center of Srednekolymsky District in
352-542: The summer, river transport takes place, and in the winter, land transport can be performed on the ice. Srednekolymsk has a dry and very cold subarctic climate ( Köppen climate classification Dfc ), bordering on an extreme subarctic climate ( Köppen climate classification Dfd ), featuring with mild, sometimes hot, even very hot, but short summers and extremely brutal winters with almost no snowfall. The winter lasts from October until May and temperatures rise rapidly enough for Dahurian larch trees to be able to grow during
374-524: 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
396-529: Was Srednekolymsk and that the main Russian center was moved to Nizhnekolymsk by 1655 when the Anadyrsk route became important. At some point the name was changed to Yarmanka , from the Russian word for "fair", referring to the annual gatherings of indigenous inhabitants of the area here in spring. The settlement grew over the next century, and was granted town status and its present name in 1775. In Imperial times, it
418-484: Was a destination for political exiles. Within the framework of administrative divisions , Srendekolymsk serves as the administrative center of Srednekolymsky District . As an inhabited locality , Srednekolymsk is classified as a town under district jurisdiction. As an administrative division, it is, together with one rural locality (the selo of Lobuya ), incorporated within Srednekolymsky District as
440-458: Was on the delta near the route to Anadyrsk . Srednekolymsk was at the head of navigation by seagoing koches , in forested country for good fur trapping and on the overland route to the Indigirka River . Verkhnekolymsk was smaller and upriver. The first fort ( ostrog ) was founded in 1644 by Mikhail Stadukhin . Some say that this was Nizhnekolymsk, but Fisher thinks that the original fort
462-441: 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
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#1733084521651484-467: 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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