Discovery of Severnaya Zemlya
Descubrimiento de Severnaya Zemlya (Tierra del Norte)
- Date
- septiembre de 1913 · confidence high
- Place
- Severnaya Zemlya, Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia
- Credited to
- Boris Vilkitsky (Arctic Ocean Hydrographic Expedition)
- Field
- Cosmos & Earth
What was discovered
The icebreakers Taymyr and Vaygach sighted in 1913 an archipelago of about 37,000 km² north of Siberia, the last large landmass discovered on the planet. It was charted between 1930 and 1932 by Ushakov and Urvantsev.
The archipelago was first called Nicholas II Land; the expedition saw only part of the eastern coast and did not know whether it was islands or a continent until 1930-1932.
What it led to
- complete mapping of Eurasia's last unknown coastline
- the Northern Sea Route and Soviet Arctic exploration