The Arctic Ocean is a huge 14 million square km area of \u200b\u200bwater and ice that spans the Arctic Circle.<\/p>\n
To give us an idea, its area is more than three times the total area of \u200b\u200bthe European Union<\/strong>. Its waters bathe more than 45,000 kilometers of coasts of Russia, Finland, Norway, Greenland, Iceland, Canada and the United States. Russia's northernmost port, Tiksi, is on this ocean.<\/strong> That town was founded in 1933, during Stalin's dictatorship, as part of the project known as the Northern Sea Route, from New Zealand to the Bering Strait. During World War II, this port was used by Soviet Arctic convoys<\/strong>, a tough supply route that sought to avoid the action of German submarines.<\/p>\n Tiksi lived its greatest splendor during the Cold War<\/strong>. The Soviet Air Force established two air bases there, Tiksi North (abandoned in the 1960s) and Tiksi West, used by Tupolev Tu-95 strategic bombers and abandoned after the fall of the USSR. Furthermore, in the 1950s an airport was built<\/strong> in the northeast, which practically ceased to have operations in 2012, although it is occasionally used by the few flights that arrive there.<\/p>\n In 1989 Tiksi had more than 11,000 inhabitants<\/strong>, but from then on the population began to decrease, especially after the closure of the Tiski West air base. Today Tiksi has about 4,400 inhabitants<\/strong>, who endure average temperatures of up to -30\u00baC in winter (with extremes of up to -50\u00baC) and a long polar night that lasts from November 19 to 24 January<\/strong>. Tiksi is part of the Sakha Republic, an administrative division of Russia with an area of \u200b\u200bmore than 3 million square km (about six times the size of Spain), but with less than a million inhabitants.<\/p>\n A few days ago, the channel Ninurta<\/a> published a video showing the boats, Tiksi<\/strong>'s abandoned planes and houses. The video shows the extreme cold of that desolate frozen wasteland and its terrible effects:<\/p>\n
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