Norilsk, in northern Russia, is -after Murmansk- the second-largest city within the Arctic Circle, with a population of over 177,000.
Even nowadays Norilsk has no ground connection with the rest of the world: it can be reached only by plane and the seaway.

It is also one of the ten most polluted cities in the world. 2 million tons of gas rejected every year in the atmosphere; 100.000 ha of tundra in the radius of 30 km is dead; the life expectancy is 10 years less than in other regions of Russia. The risk of cancer is two times higher. Respiratory diseases are spread.

Rich metal and mineral deposits make the region a primary global source of such commodities as nickel, cobalt, platinum and palladium, and Norilsk maintains the biggest metallurgical and mining complex in the world. Almost 56% of the present population is involved in the industrial process.

Norilsk was founded in the 1935s, and until 1956 operated as a Soviet Gulag. During 20 years around 500 000 prisoners, from which thousands have lost their lives, labored there in the conditions of intense cold, starvation, and forced under construction of the mines and factories and the city itself.

Norilsk endures an extremely harsh climate, with temperatures dropping below -50°C in the winter, and rising into the high 20s or 30s in the brief summer months. The city is covered in snow for 250-270 days a year, has frequent violent snowstorms and experiences polar nights from November to mid-January, when the sun does not rise above the horizon.

The polar days and nights cycle has a strong influence on the physical and psychological conditions of the human body. The Norilsk’s citizens suffer ‘the polar night syndrome’, resulting in anxiety, nervousness, drowsiness or insomnia, depending of the seasons. The psychological discomfort and poor emotional stimuli also generate many cases of depression.

Norilsk is thus a living example of human adaptation to extreme conditions of climate, ecological disaster and isolation, living in autarky.

Text by Elena Chernyshova