Maria Pronchishcheva Bay (russian: Бухта Марии Прончищевой, or ''Bukhta Marii Pronchishchevoy'') is a body of water in

Krasnoyarsk Krai Krasnoyarsk Krai ( rus, Красноя́рский край, r=Krasnoyarskiy kray, p=krəsnɐˈjarskʲɪj ˈkraj) is a federal subject of Russia (a krai), with its administrative center in the city of Krasnoyarsk, the third-largest city in Siber ...

Russian Federation Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

. It was named after pioneering Russian explorer

Vasili Pronchishchev Vasili Vasilyevich Pronchishchev (russian: Василий Васильевич Прончищев) (1702–) was a Russian explorer. In 1718, Vasili Pronchishchev graduated from Moscow School of Mathematics and Navigation and was promoted to nava ...

's wife Maria.

Geography

Maria Pronchishcheva Bay is a deep

sound In physics, sound is a vibration that propagates as an acoustic wave, through a transmission medium such as a gas, liquid or solid. In human physiology and psychology, sound is the ''reception'' of such waves and their ''perception'' by the ...

inlet An inlet is a (usually long and narrow) indentation of a shoreline, such as a small arm, bay, sound, fjord, lagoon or marsh, that leads to an enclosed larger body of water such as a lake, estuary, gulf or marginal sea. Overview In marine geogra ...

in the southwestern shore of the

Laptev Sea The Laptev Sea ( rus, мо́ре Ла́птевых, r=more Laptevykh; sah, Лаптевтар байҕаллара, translit=Laptevtar baỹğallara) is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. It is located between the northern coast of Siberia, th ...

. It is located about 75 km north of the mouth of the

Khatanga Gulf The Khatanga Gulf or Khatanga Bay (russian: Хатангский залив) is a large tidal estuary in the Laptev Sea. It is relatively narrow, its length being with a maximum width of . Geography The Bolshoy Begichev Island divides the gulf i ...

, on the eastern side of the

Taymyr Peninsula The Taymyr Peninsula (russian: Таймырский полуостров, Taymyrsky poluostrov) is a peninsula in the Far North of Russia, in the Siberian Federal District, that forms the northernmost part of the mainland of Eurasia. Administrati ...

. It is narrow (about 4 km in average) and long (about 60 km from the mouth to its deepest recess). Lat 75° 45' and long 113°.Topographic map S- 49 -V, VI (in Russian)
/ref> The

Byrranga Mountains The Byrranga Mountains (russian: го́ры Бырра́нга; ''Gory Byrranga'') are a mountain range in the middle of the Taymyr Peninsula, Siberia, Russia. Even though they were first explored in 1736, the Byrranga Mountains are one of the lea ...

rise to the west and quite a few rivers, two of them of considerable size, flow into it from the west and the southwest.

Claimate

The climate in the area is exceptionally severe, with prolonged, bitter winters, so that the inlet is covered by ice most of the year.

History

In 1933 icebreaker ''Rusanov'', commanded by Captain Yerokhin brought a party led by S. P. Zhuravlev to Maria Pronchishcheva Bay and unloaded men, women and materials there. The plan was to establish a permanent base camp in the shores of the inlet in order to exploit the resources of this area of the

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

Arctic. The men were experienced in trapping and the idea was that they should get their own food. In the spring of the following year, several of the 21 people of the base (ten men, four women and seven children) were afflicted with

scurvy Scurvy is a disease resulting from a lack of vitamin C (ascorbic acid). Early symptoms of deficiency include weakness, feeling tired and sore arms and legs. Without treatment, decreased red blood cells, gum disease, changes to hair, and bleeding ...

. They were healed by Dr. Urvantseva, who travelled by dogsled from the provisional wintering station that had been set by her husband scientist

Nikolay Urvantsev Nikolay Nikolayevich Urvantsev (russian: Николáй Николáевич Урвáнцев; – 20 February 1985) was a Soviet geologist and explorer. He was born in the town of Lukoyanov in the Lukoyanovsky Uyezd of the Nizhny Novgorod Gove ...

at the

Komsomolskaya Pravda Islands The Komsomolskaya Pravda Islands (russian: Острова Комсомольской Правды, ''Ostrova Komsomol'skoy Pravdy'') are an archipelago in the far north of the Russian Federation. The islands are uninhabited and are covered with tun ...

the same year. The doctor stayed 11 days at the Bukhta Marii Pronchishchevoy camp until she could see clear signs of improvement as a result of the dietary changes prescribed by her. During the 1930s the whole area surrounding Maria Pronchishcheva Bay experienced a limited boom owing to the first icebreaker convoys plying the

Northern Sea Route The Northern Sea Route (NSR) (russian: Се́верный морско́й путь, ''Severnyy morskoy put'', shortened to Севморпуть, ''Sevmorput'') is a shipping route officially defined by Russian legislation as lying east of Nov ...

Tiksi Bay Tiksi Bay (russian: Бухта Тикси, ''Bukhta Tiksi'') is a bay of the Laptev Sea that cuts into the northern part of the Sakha Republic, Russia. History This bay was first surveyed by Russian Arctic explorer Dmitry Laptev in 1739. It was t ...

and Mys Shmidta had become airports and nearby

Nordvik Nordvik is a former municipality in Nordland county, Norway. The municipality existed from 1917 until its dissolution in 1962. The island municipality encompassed the central part of the island of Dønna as well as the smaller surrounding is ...

was "a growing town."

Bibliography

William Barr William Pelham Barr (born May 23, 1950) is an American attorney who served as the 77th and 85th United States attorney general in the administrations of Presidents George H. W. Bush and Donald Trump. Born and raised in New York City, Barr ...

, ''The First Soviet Convoy to the Mouth of the Lena''.

References

{{reflist

External links