Murmansk: Why the largest ARCTIC city EXISTS?

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Murmansk has a population of roughly 300'000 people. That makes it the largest city in the arctic circle. How did this city begin and why live so far north? Explore some Russian history and geography with me.

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SOURCES:
Wikepedia
https://www.rcinet.ca/eye-on-the-arctic/2019/10/21/murmansk-depopulation-demographics-government-derunova-russia/
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1755-1315/302/1/012086/pdf
https://barentsobserver.com/en/society/should-i-stay-or-should-i-go
https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-02406613/document
https://en.climate-data.org/asia/russian-federation/murmansk-oblast/murmansk-3338/



Script

Murmansk, the Arctic capital

At a latitude of roughly 65.5 lies the Arctic circle. Few major human settlements exist within its borders. The largest of these settlements is Murmansk and as its name suggests it is a city on the edge of the world.

It lies 2 degrees above the Arctic circle and is 108 kilometers from the Norwegian Border and 182 from the Finnish. The closest major Russian city is St Petersburg roughly 900km away.

The city experiences Polar nights for roughly 40 days at a time. This means that between early December and mid January the sun does not rise. The opposite starts from the middle of May till the end of August during which the sun does not set.

For an Arctic city the climate is relatively mild with peak summer temperatures averaging 12.9c in July and peak winter cold in February at -10.7c on average.

This is largely a benefit of the warm North Atlantic current

This means that Murmansk is the only Russian port with unrestricted and easy year round access to the North Atlantic Ocean.

As a result, the port is the 4th largest in the country and is one of the main stops along the Arctic's Northeast Passage connecting Asia and Europe making Murmansk one of the most strategically important assets for Russia.

In the early stages of WW1 Russia had only two harbours in its Northwest, the one in St Petersburg and Anhargelsk. With the first port blockaded and the other freezing over during winter another port was necessary.

With this in mind, Murmansk officially became a city in 1916 with the intention of becoming one of Russia's main ports. This also made it the last city created during the era of the Russian Empire as the Bolshevik revolution soon overthrew the monarchy and established the Soviet Union.

It was during the revolution that started in 1917 that Murmansk received its first war time supplies. The Allies wanted Russia to remain a monarchy rather than turn into a comunist country and so supplies were sent to aid the White Army.

An even bigger role for the port came during WW2.

In June 1941, Stalin was taken by surprise when Hitler made his move against him.

At this time Russia was unprepared to wage a major war having had banked on their deal with Germany to delay war for a few years.

German forces in Finnish territory launched an offensive against Murmansk in 1941 as part of Operation Silver Fox.

The city suffered extensive destruction, the magnitude of which was rivaled only by the destruction of Leningrad and Stalingrad. However, fierce Soviet resistance and harsh local weather conditions with the bad terrain prevented the Germans from capturing the city and cutting off the vital railway line and the ice-free harbor