On 31 august 1929 the polar station Bukhta Tikhaya began to work and became the first Soviet permanent settlement in the archipelago.

The polar station Bukhta Tikhaya was founded near the wintering site of the Georgy Sedov polar expedition.

15 years later, in 1929, a member of that expedition Vladimir Wiese returned to Tikhaya Bay on board the icebreaker Georgy Sedov to found on this place the first Soviet polar station on Franz Josef Land.

All the time of its existence the polar station was the capital of Soviet Arctic, the most advanced and one of the largest high-latitude stations of the Soviet Union. Over the years of its work Bukhta Tikhaya became an observatory where the numerous scientific observations were performed.

In 1932-1933, Bukhta Tikhaya worked in accordance with the expanded research
program within the framework of the Second International Polar Year.

The most advanced technologies worked out there, the latest research was carried out. Numerous Arctic expeditions were based at the station, it provided radio contact to the outstanding_transpolar flights of Valery Chkalov and Mikhail Gromov in 1937.

During the Second World War, the heroic wintering team of 1940-1945 worked at the polar station without the supply of food and fuel almost irremovably.

The names of famous Soviet scientists Vladimir Wiese and Pavel Molchanov, polar explorers Ivan Papanin and Ernst Krenkel, pilots Mikhail Vodopianov and Mikhail Babushkin, etc. are connected with the polar station Bukhta Tikhaya.

During the years of operation of the polar station Bukhta Tikhaya, 11 children were born here.

The whole complex of the polar station's buildings is kept down to our days as an example of the settlement which was giving a man the possibility to survive in the extreme conditions of the High Arctic.

 

Information provided by the Directorate of the National Park "Russian Arctic"