Rudnaya Pristan (russian: Ру́дная При́стань, lit. ''

Ore Ore is natural rock or sediment that contains one or more valuable minerals, typically containing metals, that can be mined, treated and sold at a profit.Encyclopædia Britannica. "Ore". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved 7 Apr ...

Wharf A wharf, quay (, also ), staith, or staithe is a structure on the shore of a harbour or on the bank of a river or canal where ships may dock to load and unload cargo or passengers. Such a structure includes one or more berths (mooring locatio ...

'') is a

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

('' selo'') located at the mouth of the Rudnaya River, on the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contine ...

coast of

Primorsky Krai Primorsky Krai (russian: Приморский край, r=Primorsky kray, p=prʲɪˈmorskʲɪj kraj), informally known as Primorye (, ), is a federal subject (a krai) of Russia, located in the Far East region of the country and is a part of t ...

. It is situated 35 km east of

Dalnegorsk Dalnegorsk (russian: Дальнего́рск, lit. ''far in the mountains'') is a town in Primorsky Krai, Russia. Population: Name It was formerly known from its founding in 1897 as Tetyukhe (russian: Те́тюхе; ; literally meaning "river ...

(also in

) and approximately 514 km north of

Vladivostok Vladivostok ( rus, Владивосто́к, a=Владивосток.ogg, p=vɫədʲɪvɐˈstok) is the largest city and the administrative center of Primorsky Krai, Russia. The city is located around the Golden Horn Bay on the Sea of Japan, c ...

. Its population was 2,107 in 2010, 2,389 in 2002, and 2,947 in 1989.

Lead Lead is a chemical element with the symbol Pb (from the Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. Lead is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. When freshly cu ...

smelting Smelting is a process of applying heat to ore, to extract a base metal. It is a form of extractive metallurgy. It is used to extract many metals from their ores, including silver, iron, copper, and other base metals. Smelting uses heat and a ...

has been the town's primary industry since a plant was built there in 1930. The plant has provided steady employment for most of the area's families since that time, but at enormous cost to both the health of the residents and the local environment. The residents suffer from many health problems, including an inordinately high rate of

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

, and the soil has become heavily contaminated with lead-related by-products. The

Blacksmith Institute Pure Earth is a New York City-based international not-for-profit organization founded in 1999 that works to identify, clean up, and solve pollution problems in low- and middle-income countries, where high concentrations of toxic pollution have dev ...

consequently declared Rudnaya Pristan, along with

, one of the ten worst polluted places on earth, although

Anatoly Lebedev Anatoly (russian: Анато́лий, Anatólij , uk, Анато́лій, Anatólij ) is a common Russian and Ukrainian male given name, derived from the Greek name ''Anatolios'', meaning "sunrise." Other common Russian transliterations are Ana ...

, leader of the ecological

NGO A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from government. They are typically nonprofit entities, and many of them are active in h ...

''BROK'', disputes this inclusion. Despite its coastal location, Rudnaya Pristan's harbor has remained largely undeveloped, and its

climate Climate is the long-term weather pattern in an area, typically averaged over 30 years. More rigorously, it is the mean and variability of meteorological variables over a time spanning from months to millions of years. Some of the meteorologi ...

is harsh, dominated in winter by the vast Siberian high-pressure system and in summer by remnants of the East Asian

monsoon A monsoon () is traditionally a seasonal reversing wind accompanied by corresponding changes in precipitation but is now used to describe seasonal changes in atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with annual latitudinal oscil ...

. This combination results in very cold, dry winters with generally high winds, and muggy summers that provide ideal conditions for the breeding of

mosquito Mosquitoes (or mosquitos) are members of a group of almost 3,600 species of small flies within the family Culicidae (from the Latin ''culex'' meaning " gnat"). The word "mosquito" (formed by ''mosca'' and diminutive ''-ito'') is Spanish for "li ...

es.

Climate

References

Rural localities in Primorsky Krai {{Russia-stub