Igarka

Igarka (Russian Игарка ) is a Russian seaport and once an important center of the timber industry to a river island in the Yenisei in Krasnoyarsk in Central Siberia, 163 km north of the Arctic Circle. You should be eastern terminus of the Arctic Circle Railway, which was completed in the last years of the reign of Josef Stalin to a large extent. For over two decades, the population is decreasing: since 1989 they fell by two-thirds to now only 6183 (as of October 14, 2010 ).

History

Igarka was founded in 1929 referred to as the since Igarkischen flow (Russian Игарская протока ) tributary of the Yenisei as sawmill and deep-sea port for timber exports in 1931 and got awarded the status of a city. 1936-1942 there a scientific laboratory was also operated in the 7-10 m deep passages in the permafrost and the ever prevailing there temperatures from -5 to -6 ° C uses the permafrost were explored.

Under Joseph Stalin the USSR Council of Ministers decided on 29 January 1949 District Igarka a base for the Soviet Navy to build on the Yenisei. From the city to the port Salechard Igarka No. 501 should a 1200 km long Arctic Circle railway to be built by the Ob River and No. 503 on the Yenisei under the names project. So, in the north of the Krasnoyarsk region, the construction project No. 503 The headquarters was located in the village Jermakowo. After Stalin's death, the construction was halted in the summer of 1953 and taken from the planning of the naval base distance. Only the telephone line between Salechard Igarka and remained until 1976. Provided to the non-completion due surnamed Mjortwaja doroga ( The dead line ) circuit reminds now a museum on the outskirts.

In Igarka a museum was opened on the subject of permafrost on 1 July 1991, in the property of the old science lab. There are next to filed and preserved in ice objects, various soil layers and up to 30,000 -year-old larch trees, which have been preserved in the soil.

Economy

The approximately 670 km from the Jenisseimündung distant seaport of Igarka was commissioned in 1928 and was then used for both the loading of products in the local sawmill and the pilfered from Lessosibirsk by riverboats products on ocean-going ships. The port reached its heyday in mid -1970, than were to be shipped to 1,236,000 cubic meters of wood in the early 1980s and he was the second largest port for timber in the Soviet Union.

Igarka has on is opposite the side arm of the Jenisseis river island has an airport (IATA: ILO, ICAO: UOII, Russian Аэропорт " Игарка " ) with flights to Krasnoyarsk, Norilsk and Surgut, which is directly accessible in summer by ferry in winter.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the decline of the sawmill and the operation in the port fell sharply. This result and the return migration of Ukrainians, Balts and other members of nations now independent former Soviet republics that have become lost Igarka two thirds of the inhabitants, especially the end of the 1990s, culminating in a veritable exodus. In the meantime, there were plans to evacuate Igarka and the resettlement of the remaining population in southern areas of the Krasnoyarsk region, but due to the use of the already begun in 2009 In 1988, 130 km west of Igarka nearby oil field Wankor were abandoned. Instead, invest oil companies in the infrastructure of the city, especially in the situated on the river island airport. Igarka has taken place in November 2001 barring the further downstream cities Dudinka and Norilsk for foreigners end point for cruises on the Yenisei.

Demographics

Note: Census data