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32-572: It is located on the western side of the Chaunskaya Bay , directly off the Nutel'gyrgym Peninsula, at the eastern end of the Kolyma Gulf . The island is 63 km (39 mi) long and 38 km (24 mi) wide with an area of 2,156 km (832 sq mi) and a coastline of 550 km (340 mi). It is generally low and flat and there are many small lakes and swamps. Ayon Island

64-502: A considerably high level of unemployment in the town. This has led to a spike in alcohol abuse—specifically vodka drinking— which not only fuels sociological problems and public intoxication, but also sanitation issues associated with public urination and defecation. This, combined with public dumps, littered vodka bottles, and general trash can breed pathogens leading to disease. Some deadly infections can spread to reindeer, as they may come into contact with these waste areas, further reducing

96-554: A few thousand tons, and in 1997, Mys Shmidta , traditionally the second most important of the northern Chukotkan ports, was handling nearly four times as much cargo. The future does not look promising either, and although mining for other materials such as tin still occurs in the region, many of the mines have closed, being deemed unprofitable, and a number of settlements, such as Iultin , Komsomolsky , and Krasnoarmeysky have been depopulated, with any remaining economic activity producing only very low cargo volumes at best. The result of

128-427: A maximum ship draft of 10.25 meters (33.6 ft). There is some mining in the area; tin , mercury , gold , and black coal deposits are all located near the town. However, many of the mines that previously produced significant quantities of minerals for export have been deemed to become unprofitable and have closed. Most mining that takes place in the region is relatively low key. However, this level of activity

160-436: Is a protected natural area in the southeast. Lake Elgygytgyn is about 160 km southeast and the town of Bilibino about 160 km southwest. The first Russian to reach the area was probably Mikhail Stadukhin in 1649. This Chukotka Autonomous Okrug location article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Pevek Pevek ( Russian : Певе́к ; Chukchi : Пээкин / Пээк , Pèèkin / Pèèk )

192-461: Is a modern settlement established after World War I to provide a port for the export of minerals as part of the expanding Northern Sea Route . During the 1940s and 1950s, the area surrounding Pevek was the site of several gulags where prisoners mined uranium . In recent years, many of the mines became unprofitable and have closed, causing many residents to move to more central regions in Russia and

224-822: Is an Arctic port town and the administrative center of Chaunsky District in Chukotka Autonomous Okrug , Russia , located on Chaunskaya Bay (part of the East Siberian Sea ) on a peninsula on the eastern side of the bay facing the Routan Islands , above the Arctic Circle , about 640 kilometers (400 mi) northwest of Anadyr , the administrative center of the autonomous okrug . Population: 4,015 ( 2021 Census ) ; 4,162 ( 2010 Census ) ; 5,206 ( 2002 Census ) ; 12,915 ( 1989 Soviet census ) . Pevek

256-553: Is characteristic for subtropical areas with very mild climate. The lowest temperature ever recorded was −50.0 °C (−58.0 °F) on February 7, 8 and 10, 1978, and the highest was +29.2 °C (84.6 °F) on July 8, 2010. The town is a large port on the Northern Sea Route , the most important northern port in Chukotka , although shipping levels have dropped significantly in recent years. The port

288-606: Is presently to be found only from Murmansk to Dudinka in the west and between Vladivostok and Pevek in the east. Ports between Dudinka and Pevek have virtually no shipping. The workforce for the mines that provided the Soviet Union with tin and uranium throughout the large parts of the 20th century were prisoners in the Gulag system. There was a network of camps in the region itself, through which an uncertain number of criminal and political prisoners passed. There are

320-552: Is separated from the mainland by the Maly Chaunsky Strait , a shallow channel which is barely 2 km (1.2 mi) wide in its narrowest spot. The bay to the south and east is Chaunskaya Guba. Administratively and municipally, Ayon Island belongs to Chaunsky District , part of Chukotka Autonomous Okrug of the Russian Federation . There are two small settlements, Elvuney (now abandoned) and Ayon in

352-474: Is still gold mining around Bilibino and Leningradsky , there is little in the way of cargo generation as a result of that industry. The port is not a significant exporter of goods at all and is mainly responsible for dealing with the import of fuel (coal from Beringovsky and oil from Europe and the United States) for the region, though in the second half of the 1990s even this activity rarely exceeded

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384-601: Is still sufficient to provide enough business to keep two processing plants in Pevek. A floating nuclear power plant, Akademik Lomonosov , is located in Pevek. It started commercial operation in May 2020. It has two small reactors that generate 35 megawatts of electricity each. Besides the port as a key transport link with the rest of Russia, the town is also served by the Pevek Airport , located 17 kilometers (11 mi) to

416-485: Is that the name is derived from the Chukchi word "Pagytkenay", meaning "smelly mountain". Legend has it that a battle was fought on the site of the modern town between the local Chukchi and Yukaghir peoples . At the time, there was no tradition of burying the dead among the indigenous people, so the odor of rotting flesh was present for a long time. This legend suggests a reason why when Russian explorers first discovered

448-461: Is the coldest month, with average temperature of −27.5 °C (−17.5 °F), while July, with +8.7 °C (47.7 °F), is the warmest. Although the average temperature for July is below +10.0 °C (50.0 °F), sometimes it may be several degrees warmer with a record high average of +15.7 °C (60.3 °F) for July 2007. Sometimes, but very rarely, it happens that the lowest night temperature stays above +20.0 °C (68.0 °F), which

480-719: Is the eastern base of the northern sea route's Marine Operations Headquarters, run by the Far East Shipping Company (FESCO) from an icebreaker in the harbor, though the port is still owned by the Russian Ministry of Transport. The port's authority stretches as far as 125° east, just west of the Lena River . Past this point, the western Marine Operations Headquarters, in Dikson , has control. The headquarters govern all routes that ships take when using

512-495: The administrative center of Chaunsky District , to which it is directly subordinated. As a municipal division , the town of Pevek is, together with two rural localities (the selos of Apapelgino and Yanranay ) incorporated within Chaunsky Municipal District as Pevek Urban Settlement . Pevek has a tundra climate ( Köppen ET ), with long, very cold winters, and short, cool summers. February

544-621: The 1760s. The earliest records of the settlement of Pevek were made by the writer Tikhon Semushkin , who discovered a Chukchi hunting lodge and yaranga in 1926. By the mid-1930s, Pevek became an important port in the region, due to the natural harbor provided by Chaunskaya Bay, the expansion of the Northern Sea Route , and the discovery of tin at the Pyrkakay mine (which would later be renamed Krasnoarmeysky ) 60 kilometers (37 mi) away. The discovery of minerals throughout this region meant Pevek had an important part to play in importing

576-617: The bay, they did not find any settlement, as the Chukchi refused to settle in the region following the battle and only brought their animals to pasture in the summer. The area around Pevek was already known to Russians by the mid-18th century, as the records of the Great Northern Expedition document the discovery of Cape Shelag . Further references to the cape were made in the records of the Billings expedition, with Russian explorers first describing Chaunskaya Bay in

608-400: The closing of the mines in the region is that many people have moved to other regions of Russia. This has caused the almost complete eradication of an export market as well as a corresponding drop in the required level of imports. This causes a lack of demand for the facilities at the port whose precarious profitability leads to a lack of investment. This decaying infrastructure is endemic across

640-469: The collective in Ayon was turned into a formal Kolkhoz that would eventually have around 22,000 reindeer under its control. In addition to reindeer herding, the new collective was also engaged in sea-hunting and the collection of furs. A polar station was established on the site of the village in 1941 and the icebreaker Krasin brought Pyotr Sidersky and a crew of seven people to man the new station. This

672-563: The east and an unnamed part of Ayon Island to the west. It narrows where the Pevek Peninsula on the east approaches Ayon Island. Owing to is northerly location Chaunskaya Bay is covered with ice most of the year. This bay is the center of one of the larger lowlands in Chukotka. A number of rivers flow into the southeastern corner: Chaun River , Ichuveyem River , Palyavaam River , Lelyuveyem River and Pucheveyem River . There

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704-432: The northeast of the town in the village of Apapelgino , a locality established specifically to house the airport's staff. The airport provides flights to major regional centers such as Anadyr and Bilibino , as well as to Moscow . Pevek also has the most developed road infrastructure in the autonomous okrug. There is approximately 150 kilometers (93 mi) of year-round, paved roads going to local destinations such as

736-461: The northern sea route and makes the supply route unreliable. For example, winter fuel bound for Pevek did not arrive until the end of November in 1998; this is for a port whose average sailing season lasts only until October 25. A slight recovery is perhaps indicated by an increase in cargo handled. In 1997, Pevek handled over 200,000 tons of cargo, second only to Dudinka of the true northern sea route ports, with 1,143,000 tons. The port has

768-579: The northern sea route, organizing convoys and providing up-to-date information on ice conditions throughout their sphere of influence. Apart from FESCO, the port is also used by the Arctic Shipping Company , based in Tiksi , who take coal from Zheleny Mys to Pevek. Despite its prominence as the eastern Marine Operations Headquarters, the level of cargo the port has had to deal with in recent years has been declining rapidly. Although there

800-465: The northwestern end of the island. The name of the island is thought to come from one of two sources. Firstly, it is suggested that it comes from the Chukchi word "Ayo" , meaning "brain", as the islands shape is somewhat like a brain. The second school of though is that it is derived from Chukchi meaning "coming alive", in reference to the fact that although the island is covered in ice and snow during

832-530: The port infrastructure to decay. Pevek is the present location of the Akademik Lomonosov floating nuclear power plant, which carries two marine-type KLT-40S nuclear reactors generating 35 megawatts of electricity each. There are two theories for the origin of the town's name. The first is that it is derived from the Chukchi word for fat ; it was originally named for the nearby hill Peekin'ey , meaning "swollen mountain". The more macabre theory

864-406: The remains of two large camps, "North" and "West", which continued to supply uranium during and after World War II . Barracks dot the landscape and have the appearance of being hastily abandoned. Large graveyards on the edge of the various encampments show that a large proportion of those sent to work in the mines did not survive. Within the framework of administrative divisions , Pevek serves as

896-570: The required plant and machinery and exporting the extracted minerals and by 1950, the settlement had nearly 1,500 permanent residents. On April 6, 1967, Pevek was granted town status. During the 1990s, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union , the town's population dropped by more than half as commercial navigation in the Arctic declined, and people began to gravitate towards the central Russian regions. More or less regular shipping

928-538: The size of the herd. Chaunskaya Bay The Chaunskaya Bay or Chaun Bay ( Russian : Чаунская губа ) is an Arctic bay in the East Siberian Sea , in Chaunsky District , Chukotka , northeast Siberia. There is Port of Pevek . The bay is open to the north and is 140 km in length. Its maximum width is 110 km. Its mouth is defined by Cape Shelagsky , the end of the Shelag Range , to

960-406: The winter, in the summer, this melts and the island provides a good pasture for reindeer herds as well as being the home to swarms of midges and gadflies . Following the rise of communism in the Soviet Union in the first part of the twentieth century, the native herds were collectivised in 1933 into a group called "Enmitagino". Such collectivisation was very successful on the island and in 1950,

992-430: Was the first time that the village site had been inhabited permanently, with indigenous people living there only during the summer when the reindeer were taken to pasture, with the exception of a few individuals who would over-winter in order to hunt. By 1944, the settlement had become increasingly permanent and there were 103 people living in 23 houses. However, following the collapse of the Soviet Union , state support

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1024-438: Was withdrawn and the herders—who had been used to being supplied with the latest technology by the state—now found that not only did they have to fend for themselves (with regards to the day-to-day herding) but that there was no guarantee they would even receive any money they were owed for the meat they provided to the state. The result of this was the herds shrinking from nearly 22,000 to only around 4,000, gradually growing into

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