Location East Siberian Sea Total islands 5 Highest elevation 123 m (404 ft) Area 77 km² Island group De Long Islands | Archipelago De Long Islands Width 8.7 km (5.41 mi) Elevation 123 m Max length 10.8 km | |
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Federal subject Far Eastern Federal District | ||
Zhokhov Island (Russian: Остров Жохова; Ostrov Zhokhova) is an island in the East Siberian Sea, situated 128 km north east of Novaya Sibir Island, the easternmost of the New Siberian Islands. Zhokhov Island belongs to the De Long group. It has an area of 77 km2 (30 sq mi). The highest point of the island is 123 m (404 ft). This island belongs to the Sakha (Yakutia) Republic administrative division of Russia.
Contents
Map of Zhokhov Island, Sakha Republic, Russia
Although the island itself is unglaciated, the sea surrounding Zhokhov Island is covered with fast ice in the winter and the climate is severe. The surrounding sea is obstructed by pack ice, even during the summer.
Geology
Zhokhov Island consists of extrusive basalt lava flows and tuffs. The bulk of this island is made up of a thick stack of olivine basalt, olivine trachybasalt, and nepheline basalt lava flows. Overlying these lava flows is a layer of friable volcanic ash and tuff that is capped by a thick basalt lava flow. The total thickness of volcanic rocks exposed within Zhokhov Island is about 400 meters
Vegetation
Rush/grass, forb, cryptogam tundra covers the Zhokhov Island. It is tundra consisting mostly of very low-growing grasses, rushes, forbs, mosses, lichens, and liverworts. These plants either mostly or completely cover the surface of the ground. The soils are typically moist, fine-grained, and often hummocky.
History
Mesolithic humans occupied the island as early as 6000 BCE. Tools of stone, bone, antler, and ivory have been found, as well as wooden arrow shafts and a sledge runner. Animal remains suggest a culture dependent on the hunting of polar bears and reindeer.
In modern times, Zhokhov Island was discovered by the 1910–1915 Russian Arctic Ocean Hydrographic Expedition under Boris Vilkitsky on the ships Vaygach and Taymyr. It was originally named Novopashenniy Island, after Piotr Alekseyevich Novopashenniy (1881–1950) Captain of icebreaker Vaigach, but in 1926 it was renamed after Lieutenant Alexey Zhokhov, a member of the expedition.
In popular culture
Zhokhov Island is mentioned in Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb as a place where the Russians built the doomsday device. Ostrov Zhokhova is also mentioned in the Soviet "sad comedy" film by Georgii Danelia "Osennii Marafon" (Autumn Marathon). The film's "hero" Andrei Buzykin's daughter and her husband depart to take up a job in the weather station on Zhokhov Island, to Andrei's horror.