Tanch'ŏn () is a

port city A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ha ...

in northeastern South Hamgyŏng province,

North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and T ...

. It has a population of approximately 360,000. Tanch'ŏn borders the

Sea of Japan The Sea of Japan is the marginal sea between the Japanese archipelago, Sakhalin, the Korean Peninsula, and the mainland of the Russian Far East. The Japanese archipelago separates the sea from the Pacific Ocean. Like the Mediterranean Sea, i ...

(East Sea of Korea), into which the Namdae River flows.

Administrative divisions

Tanch'ŏn is divided into 39 ''

tong Tong may refer to: Chinese *Tang Dynasty, a dynasty in Chinese history when transliterated from Cantonese *Tong (organization), a type of social organization found in Chinese immigrant communities *''tong'', pronunciation of several Chinese char ...

'' (neighbourhoods) and 39 '' ri'' (villages):

Economy

There are extensive mineral resources in the area, including

cobalt Cobalt is a chemical element with the symbol Co and atomic number 27. As with nickel, cobalt is found in the Earth's crust only in a chemically combined form, save for small deposits found in alloys of natural meteoric iron. The free element, p ...

, magnesite, and iron ore. The city is known for its chemical production, textiles, metal ware, machinery and smelting. The Komdok mine is located in Kumgol-1 dong. The Taehung mine is located in

South Hamgyong Province South Hamgyong Province (, ''Hamgyŏngnamdo''; ) is a province of North Korea. The province was formed in 1896 from the southern half of the former Hamgyong Province, remained a province of Korea until 1945, then became a province of North Kor ...

. The area is also home to the large Tanchon Power Station (under construction as of April 2020), consisting of hundreds of kilometres of waterway tunnels and a planned six power stations, that has been under construction since 2017. ;Technology The City of Tanch'ŏn is featured in the PC game

Tradewinds The trade winds or easterlies are the permanent east-to-west prevailing winds that flow in the Earth's equatorial region. The trade winds blow mainly from the northeast in the Northern Hemisphere and from the southeast in the Southern Hemisph ...

Transport

Tanch'ŏn is situated on the P'yŏngra Line and the Hŏch'ŏn Line of the

Korean State Railway The Korean State Railway (), commonly called the State Rail () is the operating arm of the Ministry of Railways of North Korea and has its headquarters at Pyongyang, P'yŏngyang. The current Minister of Railways is Chang Jun Song. History ...

.Kokubu, Hayato, 将軍様の鉄道 (Shōgun-sama no Tetsudō), In 2012 the city's port was renovated and upgraded. Tanch'ŏn port was reconstructed, and a ceremony marking the completion was taken place in December 2012. In the ceremony, a joint congratulatory message sent by the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea and the Cabinet was read to the officials and members of shock brigades who performed labor feats in the construction of the port. A trolleybus line runs within Tanchon from next to Kumgol station in Kumgol 1-dong to Kumgol 3-dong with a length of over 6 km. The line was opened in 1986 to serve the Komdok mining region though there have been no trolleybuses seen on satellite imagery since 2011.

Wildlife

The population of

Chinese goral The Chinese goral (''Naemorhedus griseus''), also known as the grey long-tailed goral or central Chinese goral, is a species of goral, a small goat-like ungulate, native to mountainous regions of Myanmar, China, India, Thailand, Vietnam, and pos ...

s in Tanch'ŏn has been designated North Korean natural monument #293.

Climate

Tanchon has a

humid continental climate A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers and freezing ...

(

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

: ''Dfa'').

References

External links

*
City profile of Tanchon
Cities in South Hamgyong Port cities and towns in North Korea {{NorthKorea-geo-stub