Severny Island


Severny Island is a Russian Arctic island. It is the northern island of the Novaya Zemlya archipelago.
It was historically called Lütke Land after Friedrich Benjamin von Lütke who explored it. It lies approximately 400 km north of the Russian mainland. It has an area of, making it the 30th-largest island in the world. It is part of Russian Arctic National Park.

Geography

Severny Island is separated from Yuzhny Island by the narrow Matochkin Strait. Forty percent of the island is covered by the Severny Island ice cap, which is the largest glacier by area and by volume in Europe. Severny Island is known for its numerous glaciers. Cape Flissingsky is the easternmost point of Severny Island.

Ice cap and glaciers

Unlike Yuzhny Island, Severny has an inner ice cap with numerous glaciers, most of which have their terminus on the eastern or western shore of the island.

History

cape, located at the southern end of the island, was used for nuclear weapons testing between 1958 and 1961. The Tsar Bomba hydrogen bomb test destroyed all buildings in the village of Severny. The village was located 55 kilometres from ground zero within the Sukhoy Nos test range. Tsar Bomba was the most powerful nuclear weapon detonated and was the most powerful anthropogenic explosion in human history. It had a yield of 50 megatons of TNT, scaled down from its maximum 100 megaton design yield. Severny is now the site of a Russian Army base and has a harbor.
There is a meteorological station at Cape Zhelaniya, Severny's northernmost cape.

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