Severnaya Zemlya
- Aqua MODIS
- 29 June 2005
- 03:30 UTC
Severnaya Zemlya (Северная Земля), translated as "North Land", are a group of islands located off the Taymyr Peninsula on the central Arctic coast of Siberia. They are separated from the mainland by the often ice-bound Vilkitskogo Strait, and are bound by the Kara Sea on the west and by the Laptev Sea on the east.
The group has a total area of some 38,800 km² and consists of four main islands: October Revolution Island (14,204 km²), Bolshevik Island (11,206 km²), Komsomolets Island (8,812 km²), and Pioneer Island (1,527 km²). There are also a number of smaller islands, including: Schmidt (467 km²), and Mal Taymyr (232 km²). The islands are mountainous, rising to a height of 965 m at Mt. Karpinski on October Revolution Island. Lowland areas consist of arctic desert, barren tundra and coastal plains vegetated with mosses and lichens.
Around 18,300 km² of Severnaya Zemlya is permanently covered in ice. Komsomolets Island (top left) contains the largest ice cap of the Russian Arctic — the Academy of Sciences Ice Cap — which covers 5,575 km² of the island in a 819 m thick ice dome that reaches 749 m above sea level. The domed ice caps of Rusanov, Karpinsky, University, Vavilov and Albanov (clockwise from the top on the central island of October Revolution) are all clearly visible in the above image. Pioneer Island (small island left of centre) contains the Pioneer Glacier, and Bolshevik Island (right in the image) carries the large Leningrad and Semenov-Tyan Shansky glaciers, and the smaller Kropotkin glacier. In all, the ice bodies of Severnaya Zemlya form 17 glacier systems comprising ice domes, ice shelves and glaciers.
Climatic conditions on the islands are severe, with an mean annual temperature of -16 °C.
