Tiksi West (Tiksi-Zapadny) was a large air base in

Sakha Republic Sakha, officially the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia),, is the largest republic of Russia, located in the Russian Far East, along the Arctic Ocean, with a population of roughly 1 million. Sakha comprises half of the area of its governing Far Eas ...

Russia 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 ...

, located about 7 km west of

Tiksi Tiksi ( rus, Ти́кси, , ˈtʲiksʲɪ; sah, Тиксии, ''Tiksii'' – lit. ''a moorage place'') is an urban locality (an urban-type settlement) and the administrative center of Bulunsky District in the Sakha Republic, Russia, located o ...

. It appeared on Department of Defense navigation charts during the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...

, and was listed as having a 13,500 ft (4100 metre) runway with jet capabilities.Operational Navigation Chart C-6, Defense Mapping Agency, 1974.
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History

The airfield was a large unimproved airstrip operated in the 1960s and 1970s. It was intended for arctic staging by

Tupolev Tu-95 The Tupolev Tu-95 (russian: Туполев Ту-95; NATO reporting name: "Bear") is a large, four-engine turboprop-powered strategic bomber and missile platform. First flown in 1952, the Tu-95 entered service with the Long-Range Aviation of the ...

strategic bombers based at southerly locations such as Belaya. It also served as a diversion airfield for Tiksi. The airfield was only operational during the wintertime, when the packed snow provided a much larger runway and tarmac area than that available at nearby

Tiksi Airport Tiksi Aerodrome is located 1 km (0.6 mi) northeast of Tiksi, Russia, and was built in the 1950s as a staging base for Soviet Long Range Aviation bombers to reach the United States (as a so-called 'bounce' aerodrome). It is used regula ...

, allowing the airfield to receive many more airplanes. This was critical as the Soviet Union only had a small number of staging bases to reach North America. It was monitored by US intelligence as a possible

Tupolev Tu-22M The Tupolev Tu-22M (russian: Туполев Ту-22М; NATO reporting name: Backfire) is a supersonic, variable-sweep wing, long-range strategic and maritime strike bomber developed by the Tupolev, Tupolev Design Bureau in the 1960s. According ...

(Backfire) staging base as late as 1980.STRATEGIC ARMS LIMITATIONS RELATED ACTIVITIES SUMMARY REPORT (SANITIZED)
June 1, 1980, CREST: CIA-RDP80T01355A000100140001-2, Central Intelligence Agency, Washington, DC. Tiksi West was abandoned at the end of the Cold War. However several POL (petroleum, oil, and lubrication) farms fed by pipelines from the port facilities remain plainly visible on satellite imagery.

References

Airports built in the Soviet Union Airports in the Arctic Airports in the Sakha Republic Populated places of Arctic Russia Former populated places in Russia {{Russia-mil-stub Soviet Long Range Aviation Arctic staging bases

History

See also

References