According to Countryaah website, the Russian Federation, including Crimea, has a little under 150 million residents. Around 75% of the Russian population live in the European part of Russia, although around 75% of the country’s area is in Asia.
Ethnic groups
There are around 160 different ethnic groups in Russia, although the majority of the population is of Russian descent (around 81%).
The remaining 19% of the population belong to minorities, whose members often only include a few tens of thousands.
National languages
The official national and official language on the territory of the Russian Federation is the East Slavic language, Russian. Around 87% of the population use the Cyrillic writing to describe this language as their mother tongue. Around 167 million people around the world call Russian their mother tongue.
In addition to Russian, more than a hundred other languages are spoken in Russia. Some of them are:
Indo-European languages spoken in Russia are:
Slavic languages / East Slavic languages (ethnic groups: Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians)
Iranian languages (ethnic groups: Ossetians, Sinti and Roma)
Germanic languages (ethnic groups: Germans, Jews or Yiddish)
Finno-Ugric languages in Russia (ethnic groups: Karelier, Komi, Mordwinen)
Spoken Altaj languages in Russia are:
Turk-Tatar languages (ethnicities: Bashkirs, Yakuts, Kazakhs, Tatars, Chuvashes)
Mongolian languages (ethnicities: Kalmyks)
Caucasian languages (ethnicities: Circassians, Chechens)
Paleo-Asian languages (ethnic groups: Chukchi)
Capital, other cities
The capital of Russia is Moscow with around 12 million residents.
Thirteen cities in Russia have more than a million residents. The largest metropolitan areas in the Russian Federation are:
Saint Petersburg with around 4.8 million residents
Novosibirsk with around 1.5 million residents
Nizhny Novgorod with around 1.3 million residents
Yekaterinburg with around 1.3 million residents
Samara with around 1.2 million residents
Omsk with around 1.1 million residents
Kazan with around 1.1 million residents
Chelyabinsk with around 1.1 million residents
Rostov- on-Don with around 1.1 million residents
Ufa with around 1.0 million residents
Volgograd with around 1.0 million residents
Perm with around 1.0 million residents
The city of Moscow on the Moskva River – the lifeline and namesake of Moscow – is today simply an outstanding political, economic, financial, infrastructural and educational center of the largest country in the world: the Russian Federation. More than 11,000,000 people live here, which makes up about 7% of the total country’s population and makes Moscow, before Istanbul, the most populous city in Europe.
Moscow is a unique experience for every visitor. The Russian capital presents itself historically again, shines with huge construction projects like Moscow-City in modern splendor and lives in its people and amusements. Impressive historical places like the Kremlin, the Red Square and of course the onion domes of St. Basil’s Cathedral, built under Ivan the Terrible are just as closely interwoven with the ideas of Moscow as Stalin’s “Seven Sisters” (also known as “Stalin fingers”) – fear-inducing real socialist buildings full of arrogance and arrogance. And who hasn’t always dreamed of attending a ballet performance by the Bolshoi Ballet in the Bolshoy Theater, one of the most famous and beautiful theaters and opera houses in the world.
Even those who are literary or interested will find more than what they are looking for in Moscow. First of all, of course, Lev Tolstoy should be mentioned again, who made the burning houses of Moscow the architectural background of his mammoth work, especially in “War and Peace”. As a special setting for John Le Carré, Moscow is also with its “Gorkij Park”
Life in Moscow today is characterized by irreconcilable contradictions, by the successes of the capitalist winners and the everyday misery of the losers in history. The latter did not manage the rapid and brutal change from communism to capitalism with such easy agility as the 30 dollar billionaires and the approximately 26,000 millionaires of the city.
There is probably no better saying than that of the great Russian writer Lev Nikolajewitsch Count Tolstoy, known in German as Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910), in which he shows how inseparably Moscow has been linked to the fate of the Russian people since its inception.
This is evident from the fact that former travelers and visitors to Russia spoke of the Russians as Muscovites and of the country proper as Muscovia.
The history of the city is as long as it is exciting: Moscow, the “third Rome” (after the real Rome and Constantinople or today’s Istanbul), was the tsarist power base and place of the Russian aristocracy for about 800 years before it became part of one of the greatest experiments in human history in 1917: communism. The next 75 years belonged to the red rulers, the Cold Warriors, who, from the point of view of the no less cold West, used the Kremlin as the power base of an “abysmally evil system”. The Moscow of these days still bears the scars, but has largely forgotten them or is now ignoring them as best it can. Today it is the Russian President Vladimir Putin who holds the reins of Russia firmly in his hands in the Kremlin, furthermore it is the new (rich) Russians who seem to own the city, and it is the expensive shops and restaurants, who, with their decadent pomp, do not welcome everyone with open arms. The Russian Orthodox Church has been allowed to be a church again for about a decade and its head, the Patriarch, in Moscow is increasingly enjoying considerable influence.
St. Petersburg is the northernmost metropolis in the world and the second largest city in Russia. The construction of the city went back to the Tsar Peter the Great. St. Petersburg should become a gateway to the west.
Even today the city still looks very western compared to other Russian cities, which is mainly due to its architecture.
St. Petersburg is climatically shaped by its location on the Gulf of Finland. The city attracts visitors from all over the world due to its classical elegance, its magnificent palaces, churches and numerous museums.
Since the city was completely planned, it is an architectural total work of art that was designed by many artists.
Baroque, classical and Art Nouveau buildings harmonize with one another in beautiful streets and in numerous squares. Petersburg owes the nickname Venice of the North to its 68 canals and numerous bridges.
Almost a tenth of the city is water. In addition to the canals, the Neva flows with its side arms right through the city.
St. Petersburg is especially beautiful during the White Nights in midsummer. The city lies at a north latitude of around 60 °, i.e. only 6.5 ° south of the Arctic Circle.
This means that on June 21st at midnight the sun disappears only 6.5 ° behind the horizon. This is called civil twilight, which leads to a mysterious brightness even at night.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union , a lot had happened in the city in the past 15 years. Above all, the facades and sights as well as the churches shine in their old splendor.
However, if you look into the run-down backyards, you can see that a lot still needs to be done.
The housing situation is also not particularly good in the satellite cities that were built around St Petersburg and where a large part of the population lives. Still, St Petersburg is one of the most beautiful cities in the world.
Novosibirsk is a modern city. It is the most important scientific, industrial and cultural center of Siberia. Despite its short history, the city is only 110 years old, it has grown to become the third largest city in Russia with around 1.4 million residents.
The Trans-Siberian Railway is ultimately responsible for the establishment and development of Novosibirsk. At the point where their route was supposed to cross the mighty Ob River, the first settlement in today’s urban area was founded in 1893. Since then, the connection to the railway has benefited the city economically. Novosibirsk is now an important traffic junction between the Trans-Siberian Railway and the Turksib Railway and has been heavily industrialized since the Second World War. At that time, important industrial plants, which were mainly intended for arms production, were shipped to the city on the Ob, which is far from the front. In post-war Russia, more and more industrial companies were settled in the city.
Even today, Novosibirsk shows the visitor from its gray, industrial side. The city looks like a typical, formerly Soviet industrial city and in the course of its short history could hardly produce any special sights. The architecture is characterized by oversized buildings of socialist classicism. And yet the city has its advantages. It has considerable scientific research facilities, which are mainly located outside the city in the science city “Akademgorok”, which was established in 1957. Together with this neighboring small town, Novosibirsk has numerous colleges and two universities and is considered the most important science center in the Russian Federation. Several theaters,
Volgograd – The former Stalingrad
Today’s Volgograd was called Tsaritsyn until 1925 and Stalingrad from 1925 to 1961.
Even young people know the Battle of Stalingrad to this day and the events of that time still shape life in this city on the Volgau – not too far from the confluence of the Volga and Don rivers.
On November 22nd, 1942, the 6th Army and its Romanian allies under their commander – the later Field Marshal Paulus – were completely surrounded by the Soviets. A cruel positional war then developed, which ended on February 2, 1943 with the surrender of the undernourished and completely exhausted Germans in the cauldron.
Of the originally approx. 230,000 soldiers, around 50,000 wounded were flown out and around 91,000 made their way to the Soviet prison camps.
Many died on the way to the camps and many later in the camps.
Only around 5,000 to 6,000 of them returned to the Federal Republic in the 1950s.
Russia: geography, map
The Russian Federation is an area of 17,075,400 square kilometers of the area after the largest country on earth and extends from Eastern Europe to North Asia, more than half of the globe. Check topmbadirectory for politics, flags, famous people, animals and plants of Russia.
However, compared to other countries, the Russian Federation is rather sparsely populated. Thus Russia has a population density of 8 people per km² and is one of the most sparsely populated countries on earth.
From the western border to the Kamchatka Peninsula (east-west extension) there is around 9,000 km, which includes a time difference of 10 hours within the country.
In the west, Russia borders Finland, Norway, Estonia, Latvia and Belarus. The much longer southern border, which extends to Central Asia, runs from Ukraine via Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Mongolia and the People’s Republic of China to North Korea.
Russia’s north-south extension is around 4,000 km. According to Abbreviation Finder, RUS stands for Russia in English. Click to see other meanings of this 3-letter acronym.
In the north, east, south-east and south-west the coastlines run to the Barents Sea and East Siberian Sea, to the Okhotsk and Japanese Seas (Eastern Sea), to the Black and Caspian Seas.
A narrow entrance to the Gulf of Finland is in the west of the country.
The country name probably developed from the historical name Rus for the residents of the Eastern Slavs in Eastern Europe. It came from the Rus people, who were of Norman descent and who lived in the 1st millennium AD. had sailed the local rivers
In this context, the Kievan Rus should be mentioned – a large empire with its center in Kiev, which emerged in 882 and had its heyday in the 10th century – which is considered to be the predecessor of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus.
Siberia
It should be noted that Siberia is not a political region, but in the broadest sense encompasses the North Asian part of Russia with an area of approx. 13 million km². The name Siberia comes from Mongolian and translates as “sleeping land.”
Ural
The Ural Mountains are around 2,400 km long mountain range, which partially forms the border between Europe and Asia. The highest mountain is the Narodnaja with a height of 1,865 m.
Borders
A total of 14 neighboring countries border Russia – that is a world record together with China. The land borders of Russia have a total length of approx. 20,017 km and the coastline to the seas of the country is approx. 37,653 km.
Area and land use
The Russian Federation is the largest country in the world by area.
The country covers a total area of 17,098,200 km² and thus covers around 1/8 of the earth’s land area.
Russia is generally divided into nine major landscapes:
The Eastern European Plains, west of the Ural Mountains
The Caspian Depression, in southwest Russia (Caspian Sea)
The West Siberian Lowlands, east of the Ural Mountains
The North Siberian Lowlands, south of the Arctic Ocean
The Central Siberian Mountains, between the rivers Yenisei and Lena
The South Siberian Mountains, the mountain ranges in southern Siberia
D ie Mitteljakutischen lowlands, in the common lowland rivers Lena and Vilyuy river
the east Siberian mountains, several consecutive Mountains east of Lena
the east Siberian lowland, south of the east Siberian sea
Thereof:
Forest
Around 40% of the country is forested. With around 763.4 million hectares, Russia has the largest contiguous forest area on earth. Around 4/5 of the Russian wood supply is stored or growing in the less developed areas of Siberia and the Far East.
Meadow and pasture land
Around 37% of the land is used as meadow or pasture land, mainly for producing hay.
Steppes
Today half of the country’s steppe areas are used for arable farming and cattle breeding.
Arable land and fields
Only 13% of the land can be used as arable land or fields for climatic reasons. Around 12% of this is arable land and is used in particular for the cultivation of cereals such as wheat and rye (53% of the sown area). Russia is the world’s largest main rye producer, but forage crops (36%), hemp, sugar beet and sunflowers are also grown in the Russian Federation, especially in the North Caucasus and the central black earth region.
Mountains
About 40% of Russia’s land area consists of mountains.
National borders
The Russian Federation shares a border with a total of fourteen states.
The total limit is around 19,990 km.
Norway (196 km)
Finland (1313 km)
Estonia (294 km)
Latvia (217 km)
Lithuania – Kaliningrad Oblast (227 km)
Poland – Kaliningrad Oblast (206 km)
Belarus (959 km)
Ukraine (1576 km)
Georgia (723 km)
Azerbaijan (284 km)
Kazakhstan (6846 km)
People’s Republic of China – Southeast (3605 km)
People’s Republic of China – South (40 km)
Mongolia (3485 km)
North Korea (19 km)
Furthermore, the exclave Oblast Kaliningrad (German: Königsberg) with its borders with Lithuania (227 km) and Poland (206 km) and the Suvorov monument, erected in 1899 by Russia with Swiss permission, in the inner-Swiss Schöllenen Gorge of Moscow will be part of the Russian Federation considered. The exclave status of the Suvorov monument is very controversial.
Coastline
The Russian Federation has a sea coast with a length of around 37,655 km. It borders the Baltic Sea, the Black Sea, the Caspian Sea, the Pacific Ocean (Bering Strait, Bering Sea, Okhotsk Sea, Sea of Japan) and the Arctic Ocean (White Sea, Barents Sea, Cara Sea, Laptev Sea, East Siberian Sea and Chukchi Sea).
Longitude and latitude
The Russian Federation covers the following latitude (abbreviation Δφ) and longitude (abbreviation Δλ):
Δφ = from around 48 ° to 81 ° north latitude Δλ = from around 019 ° to 169 ° east longitude
You can find detailed information on this subject under Longitude and Latitude.
Legal times
For the Russian Federation, the following value applies to Central European Time (CET), i.e. the time without daylight saving time. A minus sign means that it is earlier there, a plus sign that it is later than CET. There were 11 time zones as of March 28, 2010, but the government reduced them to 9 time zones with effect from March 29. In addition, the clocks have not been set back since autumn 2011, so summer time remains in winter as well.:
Δt (CET) = + 1 to + 9 h
Further and detailed explanations of the time can be found under Time zones, time.
Highest level of the sun in Moscow
Moscow lies at a northern latitude of around φ = 56 °. If the sun is at the tropic, i.e. at δ = 23.5 °, summer begins in Moscow, on June 21st. Then, for the highest position of the sun at noon, according to Eq. 1 (see position of the sun):
56 ° = (90 ° – h) + 23.5 °
so:
H = 57.5 °
At 57.5 °, the sun in Moscow has the highest level of the entire year above the horizon (more precisely: above the horizon).
High mountains
WestPeakSummit
The highest mountain in the country is the West Peak summit of Elbrus in the Caucasus with a height of 5,642 meters.
Other high mountains are:
Dykh Tau with a height of 5,203 m
Koshtan Tau with a height of 5,150 m
Pushkin with an altitude of 5,100 m
Shkhara with a height of 5068 m
Kazbek with a height of 5,047 m
Mizhirgi with a height of 5,203 m
Katyn with a height of 4,974 m
Shota Rustaveli with an altitude of 4,960 m
Borovikovs top with a height of 4,888 m
Mountains on Kamchatka
Also worth mentioning are the 160 volcanoes on the Kamchatka Peninsula with heights of up to 4,688 m, 29 of which are active.
Big mountains
About 40% of the area of Russia is mountainous. The Urals form the dividing line between the European and Asian parts of Russia. The larger mountain regions and mountains of the country are briefly presented below.
CentralSiberianMountains
This mountain region includes the Sajan Mountains with the highest mountain Munku Sardyk with an altitude of 3491 m and the highest mountain range in Siberia – the Altai Mountains with the highest mountain Munku Belucha with an altitude of 4506 m. The Altai Mountains are located in the Russian-Kazakh-Chinese-Mongolian border area
East Siberian Mountains
The East Siberian Mountains are located east of the Lena River, which branches out into various mountain ranges, such as the Verkhoyansk Mountains (2,389 m in Orlugan) and Tscherski Mountains (Pobeda, 3003 m), and reaches heights of up to 3000 m.
BaikalMountains
Chibinen
Caucasus
Kolyma Mountains
Putorana
Mountains
StanovoiMountains
Stanovoi Highlands Tannu-olaMountains
Ural Mountains
Methane leak in the East Siberian polar sea
The soil on the East Siberian Ridge in the Arctic Ocean has become unstable as a result of global warming. As a result, over an area of around 2 million km², around 7.7 million tons of methane gas (CH 4) are currently being released into the atmosphere, where they contribute significantly more to global warming than, for example, the currently hotly debated carbon dioxide (CO 2)). Methane had formed over time during the breakdown of organic substances and as a result of geological processes. On the ocean floor, water pressure and low temperatures convert it into solid methane hydrate – also known as methane ice. However, if the water temperature rises, the methane ice begins to dissolve and the methane released in the process rises as a gas to the surface of the water and into the atmosphere. If only about 1% of the methane stored at the bottom of the relatively shallow waters – the Arctic Ocean north of Siberia – is released into the atmosphere, scientists believe that methane pollution would increase by three to four times the current situation.
Up until now, the much smaller areas of permafrost on the arctic tundra were considered to be particularly “rich sources” for methane escaping.
You can find more information about global warming due to methane at Goruma here.
It is also interesting that larger gas bubbles lead to a reduction in buoyancy in the water and thus put ships in danger of sinking.
Rivers, Yenisei, Volga
Russia is a very water-rich country, there are around 120,000 rivers and streams.
Yenisei
The longest river in the country is the Yenisei in Siberia with a length of 5,870 km. The river flows into the Kara Sea, a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean.
Volga
The longest river in the European part and at the same time the longest river in Europe is the Volga with a length of 3,535 km. It connects Northern Europe with Central Asia, as it rises in the Valdai heights near the village of Volgowerkhove and flows into the Caspian Sea. Other major rivers:
The Amur flows through Russia and China and forms a natural border between the two states. It flows into the Pacific Ocean. The river has a length of around 2,825 km.
The Anadyr rises in the southeastern Anjuigebirge and flows into the Bering Sea in an elongated funnel mouth. The river has a length of around 1,145 km.
The Angara is a right tributary of the West Siberian Yenisei. The river has a length of around 1,855 km.
The Dnepr is the third longest river in Europe and flows through Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. The river has a length of around 2,220 km
The Donflows in the southwest of the European part of Russia. Its source is located in Novomoskovsk – about 200 km south-southeast of the state capital Moscow – in the Tula Oblast in central Russia. The river has a length of around 1,870 km. It flows into the Sea of Azov, a tributary of the Black Sea.
The Daugava flows through Russia, Belarus and Latvia. In the Latvian capital it flows into the Riga Bay, part of the Baltic Sea. The river has a length of around 1,820 km.
The Indigirka is a river of Siberia. It rises in the south of the Verkhoyansk Mountains and flows into the East Siberian Sea, part of the Arctic Ocean. The river has a length of around 4,250 km
The Irtysh, a tributary of the Ob, flows through China, Kazakhstan and Russia and flows into the Arctic Ocean. The river has a length of around 2,825 km.
The Jana is a stream in Siberia. The river has a length of around 875 km.
The Kuban flows in the northern Caucasus.
The Lena, along with the Ob and the Yenisei, is one of the great Siberian rivers. It flows into the Arctic Ocean. The river has a length of around 4,400 km
The Memelflows through the countries of Belarus, Lithuania and Russia. It rises south of the Belarusian capital Minsk and forms the border river between Lithuania and the Russian area around Kaliningrad, the former northeast Prussia. The river has a length of around 935 km.
The Moskva is a tributary of the Oka and flows in the central Russian areas of Smolensk and Moscow. The river has a length of around 505 km.
The Neva flows through the city of Saint Petersburg on its way from Lake Ladoga to the Baltic Sea. The river has a length of around 75 km
Der Obis formed in the South Siberian Mountains from the Bija and Katun rivers. They meet in the city of Biysk and are called the Ob river from the city of Barnaul. The river has a length of around 4,340 km.
The Oka is the largest right tributary of the Volga in the European part of Russia. It flows through numerous cities, including Aleksin, Kasimow and Murom. The river has a length of around 1,500 km.
The Pechora flows in the European part of Russia towards the Arctic Ocean, where it empties. The river has a length of around 1,810 km
Der Pregelarises from the rivers Instrutsch and Angrapa, flows over the Deime, the Großer Friedrichsgraben to the Memel and flows into the Fresh Lagoon behind the city of Kaliningrad. The river has a length of around 295 km.
The Selenga is a tributary of Lake Baikal and thus a tributary of the Angara. Rising from the source river Ider, it flows through Mongolia and Russia. The river has a length of around 1,480 km.
The Tobol, a tributary of the Irtysh, flows through the countries of Kazakhstan and Russia. The river has a length of around 1,590 km.
The Tschulym is a tributary of the Ob and flows through Russia. The river has a length of around 1,800 km
The Lower Tunguskais one of the right tributaries of the Yenisei. It rises in the south of the Central Siberian Mountains and flows south of Norilsk into the Yenisei. The river has a length of around 2,990 km.
The Eurasian Ural River flows through Russia and Kazakhstan. It rises in the Ural Mountains and flows into the Caspian Sea in several river arms. The river has a length of around 2,430 km.
The Ussuri flows as a right tributary of the Amur through Russia and China. The river has a length of around 590 km
The Vyatkarises in the western foothills of the Urals and flows into the Kama around 35 km west of Nizhnekamsk. The river is one of the most important inland waters in the east of the European part of Russia. The river has a length of around 1,315 km.
Lakes, Caspian Sea
Caspian Sea
The Caspian Sea is the largest inland lake in the world. With an area of 386,400 km² and a water volume of 78,700 km³, it also has the largest fresh water reserves. Its main tributaries are the Volga, Urals, Kura, and Terek. the lake has no significant natural outflows, but there is a navigable connection to the Black Sea via the Volga, the Volga-Don Canal, the Don, the Sea of Azov – a tributary of the Black Sea and the Kerch Strait. In addition to Turkmenistan (in the east), Azerbaijan (in the west), Iran (in the south), Kazakhstan (in the north) and Russia (in the north) border the Caspian Sea.
The greatest depth under the water surface is around 1,025 m
The sea lies roughly in a north-south direction and has a length of around 1,200 km, with a maximum width in the southern part of around 425 km. The most famous city on the Caspian Sea is certainly Baku – the capital of Azerbaijan.
This lake is not only the largest, but also the second deepest in the world. Its tributaries are the Volga, Urals, Kura and Terek. The lake forms the border between Europe and Asia, the Inner Eurasian border. The lake has no natural connection with the oceans and is called “sea” only because of its size.
Other larger lakes:
LakeBaikal with an area of around 31,500 km²
LakeLadoga with an area of around 17,703 km²
LakeOnega with an area of around 9,616 km²
Lake Peipus with an area of around 3,555 km²
Ilmensee with an area of around 730 to 2,090 km ²
Seligersee with an area of around 260 km²
Lake Baikal is not only the oldest, but also the deepest lake in the world with a depth of 1,637 m. The Caspian Sea and Lake Baikal form the largest freshwater resources in the world.
Comparisons
The Bodensee (571.5 km²) Germany, Switzerland and Austria;
the world’s largest inland lake: the Caspian Sea (393,898 km²) in Russia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan;
of Lake Ontario (19,259 sq km) in the United States and Canada
as well as the Lake Victoria (69,000 square kilometers) in Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya.
Islands, Novaya Zemlya
There are ten archipelagos in Russian territorial waters, which are located in the Baltic Sea, the North Atlantic, the Polar Sea, the Pacific and Lake Ladoga. In the North Atlantic are the islands or archipelagos Solowezki Islands, Kolgujew, Novaya Zemlya (double island), Franz Joseph Land, Severnaya Zemlya, New Siberian Islands and Wrangel Island. The islands of Sakhalin and Kuril Islands are considered to be the Pacific islands. The only island in the Baltic Sea is the island of Kotlin, which lies in front of the city of Saint Petersburg. The 43,100 residents of the St. Petersburg district of Kronstadt live on it.
Nowaja Semlja
Nowaja Semlja (German: new land “) is a sickle-shaped double island, which are separated from each other by a very narrow waterway. In the west of the double island lies the Barents Sea and in the east the Karasse. Incidentally, the great Siberian rivers Ob and Yenisei flow into the Kara Sea. The double island is part of an entire archipelago and consists of the north and south islands and numerous small islets. The North Island covers an area of 48,904 km², making it the fourth largest island in Europe. The South Island, on the other hand, is the sixth largest island in Europe with an area of 33,276 km². The total area of the double island thus covers 82,180 km ². Both islands are located above the Arctic Circle and are hardly inhabited.
On October 30, 1961, the largest human-made bomb ever was detonated here at an altitude of 4,000 m above Mityushika Bay – in the south of the North Island. It was a hydrogen bomb with the name “Tsar bomb” and an explosive force of approx. 60 megatons of TNT. The 27-ton, 8-meter-long and 2-meter-wide bomb was ejected by the carrier aircraft at a distance of 10,000 m and then fell with the help of a parachute to an altitude of 4,000 m, where it then exploded.
A total of 130 nuclear bomb tests were carried out here from 1955 to 1990 – 88 of them in the atmosphere, 39 underground and three under the surface of the water.
The Solovetsky Islands consist of six larger islands and numerous islets with a total size of around 300 km2. The largest island in the archipelago is the island of Groß-Soloviki (246 km²).
The island of Kolgujew has an area of 3,495.5 km² and belongs to the Arkhangelsk Oblast.
The Franz-Joseph-Land is made up of around 190 islands, over 80% of which are constantly covered with ice. The total area of the islands is 16,090 km2.
The Severnaya Zemlya Islands (totaling an area of 36,448 km²) sorted by size:
October Revolution Island (14,204 km ²)
Bolshevik Island (11,206 km ²)
Komsomolets Island (8,812 km²)
Pioneer Island (1,527 km²)
Schmidt Island (467 km²)
Taimyr Island (232 km²)
The New Siberian Islands consist of four larger islands with a total area of around 10,000 km².
Wrangel Island was declared the northernmost world natural heritage site by UNESCO in 2004, so that today the Wrangel Island nature reserve is located on it. The island consists of a main island with a total area of 7,608 km ² and smaller offshore islets.
Sakhalin Island is located in Sakhalin Oblast, the capital of which is Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. 59 islands belong to the Sakhalin region, including the largest eponymous island Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands. Russia’s most important natural gas reserves are located on this island.
The Kuril Islands are an archipelago with more than 30 large and small islands of volcanic origin. Their total size is 10,355 km ². The southern islands of this chain of islands are claimed by Japan; the islands of Etorofu (Russian: Iturup; 3,139 km ²), Kunashiri (Russian: Kunashir; 1,500 km ²) Shikotan (255 km ²) and the Habomai group off Nemuro (102 km ²).
The only island in the Baltic Sea, Kotlin, is connected to the mainland by a road embankment. The historically important island is located off Saint Petersburg and is better known under the name Kronstadt, the city and fortress of the same name.
The following islands or archipelagos are assigned to the country:
the double island of Novaya Zemlya with an area of 82,800 km ²
the Severnaya Zemlya archipelago with an area of 36,448 km²
the Franz-Joseph-Land archipelago with an area of 16,090 km ²
the Kuril Islands with an area of 10,355 km²
the archipelago New Siberian Islands with an area of 10,000 km ²
the island of Wrangel Island with an area of 7,608 km ²
the island of Kolguiev with an area of 3,495.5 km²
the Solovetsky Islands archipelago with an area of 300 km²
the Sakhalin archipelago with an area of 87,000 km²
Arctic Ocean, Bering Strait, Sea of Japan
Arctic Ocean (Arctic Ocean)
The northern borders with the Arctic Ocean, which is also known as the Arctic Ocean or Arctic Ocean. It is located in the Arctic and covers an area of 14.09 million km², making it the smallest ocean on earth. However, some geographers do not see it as a separate ocean but as a side sea to the Atlantic Ocean. The Arctic Ocean is connected to the Pacific by the approx. 80 km wide Bering Strait, in the middle of which are the Diomede Islands, and to the Atlantic by the approx. 1,500 m wide European Arctic Ocean. The Northern European Sea lies between Greenland and Scandinavia. The Arctic Ocean is largely covered by ice, which – depending on the geographic location – is between only 0.5 m and 6-8 m thick. The ocean has its greatest depth at 5,608 m in the so-called Molly Deep, which is approx. 140 km west of Svalbard. Spitzbergen (Svalbard) is located in the south of the Arctic Ocean and in the north of the Northern European Sea. In the southwest of the European North Sea you will find Iceland and around 440 km southeast of it the Faroe Islands.
Bering Sea
The approximately 2.26 million km² Bering Sea is located high in the north between the east coast of Siberia (Russia) and the west coast of Alaska (USA). In the north, the Bering Strait separates the Bering Sea from the Arctic Ocean at a north latitude of approx. 66 °. In the south lies the border between the Bering Sea and the Pacific at the Commander Islands (Russia) and the Aleutian Islands (USA). It reaches its greatest depth in the Aleutian Islands at 4,096 m, while large parts are hardly deeper than 100 m. Therefore it is also considered to be the largest shallow sea in the world. Japanese sea
The Sea of Japan lies between the Japanese islands and the mainland (China, Korea and Russia). It covers an area of 1,048,950 km² – with a maximum Tife of 3,745 m. In addition to Japan, there are also China, Russia and South and North Korea on the Sea of Japan.
The connections to the Pacific are the Korea Strait in the south, the Tsugaru Strait between Honshu and Hokkaido (Japan) and the La Pérouse Strait between the islands of Hokkaido (Japan) and Sakhalin (Russia).
Barents Sea, Kara Sea
Barents Sea
The Barents Sea is one of the marginal seas of the Arctic Ocean (Arctic Ocean). The sea was named in honor of the Dutch navigator Willem Barents (1550-1597). The Barents Sea is one of the shelf seas. Due to the North Atlantic Current – a branch of the Gulf Stream – many ports, many ports on the Barents Sea, are free of ice all year round. Therefore, the ports were and are often used by the military. The largest and most famous city on the Barents Sea is certainly Murmansk, in its port
The Barents Sea is bordered in the north-west by Spitzbergen (Svalbard), which belongs to Norway, and in the north by the Russian Franz Josef Land, which is about 400 km north-west of the northern tip of Nowaya Zemlya. In the east, the Barents Sea borders on the double island of Novaya Zemlya and in the south on the mainland of northwestern Russia and Scandinavia. In the west of the Barents Sea is the European Arctic Sea, in the south the White Sea and in the east the Kara Sea – which is east of Novaya Zemlya.
Kara Sea
The Kara Sea is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. It is bordered to the west by the arched double island of Novaya Zemlya. The eastern border is formed by the Severnaya Zemlya archipelago and the Taimyr Peninsula to the south. In the south the Kara Sea borders the Russian mainland and in the north it merges into the Arctic Ocean. It can therefore be stated that the sea extends from a geographical latitude of 70 ° to 80 ° north and a geographical longitude of 058 ° to 105 ° east. With an average depth of around 120 m, the sea is relatively shallow, although its deepest point north of Novaya Zemlya extends to around 620 m. The two great Siberian rivers – Yenisei and Ob – flow into the sea
Sea of Okhotsk, Baltic Sea, Pacific
Sea of Okhotsk The Sea of
Okhotsk is a marginal sea of the Pacific. The sea got its name after the small Russian port Okhotsk – located at about 59.5 ° North and 143 ° East. The sea covers an area of around 1.53 million km² – with an average depth of 970 m and a maximum depth of 3,375 m.
The sea lies in East Asia and is bounded by Siberia in the north and northwest. In the northeast it borders on the Kamchatka Peninsula, in the southeast on the Kuril Islands, in the south on the Japanese island of Hokkaidō and in the southwest on the Russian island of Sakhalin. In this respect, the sea only borders on Russia and Japan. A large part of the sea freezes over completely for a few months in winter or is covered with drift ice.
The only island is the island of Saint Jonas in the north-western part of the Sea of Okhotsk, halfway between Magadan and Nikolaevsk.
The Sea of Okhotsk is connected to the Sea of Japan by the Tatar Sound in the northwest of Sakhalin and the Strait of La Pérouse between Sakhalin and Hokkaidō.
Baltic Sea (Baltic Sea)
The Baltic Sea is considered a shallow tributary to the Atlantic Ocean, scientifically it is an epicontinental sea. It covers an area of 415,000 km², including the Kattegat, with an average depth of 52 m. The deepest point at 459 m is at Landsorttief between the Swedish peninsula Södertörn and the island of Gotland, at 58 ° 25 ‘north latitude and 18 ° 19’ east longitude. The northwestern part of the Baltic Sea, the Kattegat, passes over at Skagen into the Skagerrak, which is counted as part of the North Sea, a strait in the north of Jutland and over the Great Belt (between Funen and Zealand) and Little Belt (between Jutland and Funen) and the Öresund (between Zealand/Denmark and Sweden) is the only natural connection to the North Sea and thus to the Atlantic.
The Limfjord, which runs through Jutland and connects the North Sea in the west of Jutland at Thy and Thyborøn with the Kattegat in the east at Hals, is particularly popular with water sports enthusiasts. The northernmost limit of the Baltic Sea is in the Gulf of Bothnia on the border between Sweden and Finland at a northern latitude of 65 ° 40` – and thus just below the tropic – its southern border is at the southern end of the Szczecin Lagoon, its eastern border at St. Petersburg/Russia and the western border is located near Flensburg in the Flenzburger Förde. The three largest bays in the Baltic Sea are the Gulf of Bothnia, the Gulf of Finland and the Gulf of Riga.
The salinity of the East Sea is up to 3.2% in the Skagerak area and only 0.2% in the northernmost part of the Gulf of Bothnia. The Baltic Sea was formed at the end of the last ice age around 12,000 years ago. It has a water volume of around 22,000 km³, with around 500 km³ of fresh water being supplied annually by around 250 rivers. It is limited by the following countries: Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia and Sweden. There are a number of well-known islands in the Baltic Sea, many of which also play a major role in tourism. The larger ones in alphabetical order:
Åland (Finland)
Ærø (Denmark)
Bornholm (Denmark)
Dagö (Estonia)
Falster (Denmark)
Fehmarn (Germany)
Fyn (Denmark)
Gotland (Sweden)
Hiddensee (Germany)
Kotlin (Russia)
Langeland (Denmark)
Lolland (Denmark)
Møn (Denmark)
Öland (Sweden)
Ösel (Estonia)
Rügen (Germany)
Zealand (Denmark)
Usedom (Germany/Poland)
Wollin (Poland)
The following larger or well-known rivers flow into the Baltic Sea. In alphabetic order:
Name of the river
Length in km
Mouth of the river
Source of the river
Daugava
1,020
near Riga in Latvia
Russia
Memel
940
near Šilutė in Lithuania
Belarus
Motala stream
285
near Östersjön in Sweden
Sweden
Neva (Russia)
75
near Saint Petersburg in Russia
Russia
Or
865
near Stettin in Pola
Czech Republic
Pärnu (Estonia)
145
near Parnü in Estonia
Estonia
Peene
142
at Anklam in Germany
Germany
Pregel
125
near Kaliningrad in Russia
Kaliningrad Oblast/Russia
Torne alv
510
at Haparanda and Torneo in Sweden/Finla
Sweden
Trave
125
near Travemünde in Germany
Germany
Warnow
155
in Warnemünde in Germany
Germany
Vistula
1,045
near Gdansk in Pola
Pola
Pacific Ocean (also: Pacific, Pacific or Great Ocean)
Russia is also located on the Pacific Ocean, the largest and deepest ocean in the world. It stretches between the Arctic, North, Central and South America as well as the Antarctic, Australia, Oceania and Asia. It has a gigantic area of 166.24 million km² (excluding secondary seas) and thus covers about 35% of the entire surface of the earth. This ocean, which is larger than all continents combined, goes at its deepest point in the Mariana Trench down to 11,034 meters below the sea surface.
