Asbest () is a

town A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

Sverdlovsk Oblast Sverdlovsk Oblast ( rus, Свердловская область, Sverdlovskaya oblastʹ, p=svʲɪrdˈlofskəjə ˈobləsʲtʲ) is a federal subject (an oblast) of Russia located in the Ural Federal District. Its administrative center is the c ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

, located on the Bolshoy Reft River (right

tributary A tributary, or an ''affluent'', is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream (''main stem'' or ''"parent"''), river, or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean. Tributaries, and the main stem river into which they ...

of the Pyshma) on the eastern slopes of the

Ural Mountains The Ural Mountains ( ),; , ; , or simply the Urals, are a mountain range in Eurasia that runs north–south mostly through Russia, from the coast of the Arctic Ocean to the river Ural (river), Ural and northwestern Kazakhstan.

, northeast of

Yekaterinburg Yekaterinburg (, ; ), alternatively Romanization of Russian, romanized as Ekaterinburg and formerly known as Sverdlovsk ( ; 1924–1991), is a city and the administrative centre of Sverdlovsk Oblast and the Ural Federal District, Russia. The ci ...

. Population: It was previously known as ''Kudelka'' ( Sliver) (until 1928).

Etymology

The town is named for its

asbestos Asbestos ( ) is a group of naturally occurring, Toxicity, toxic, carcinogenic and fibrous silicate minerals. There are six types, all of which are composed of long and thin fibrous Crystal habit, crystals, each fibre (particulate with length su ...

industry.

History

It was founded in 1889 as Kudelka (). It was given its present name in 1928 and granted town status in 1933.

Administrative and municipal status

Within the framework of the administrative divisions, it is, together with the work settlements of Malysheva and Reftinsky and five rural localities, incorporated as the

Town A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

of Asbest—an administrative unit with the status equal to that of the

districts A district is a type of administrative division that in some countries is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions ...

.Law #30-OZ As a municipal division, Asbest and two rural localities are incorporated as Asbestovsky Urban Okrug.Law #85-OZ The urban-type settlement of Malysheva, together with three other rural localities, is incorporated separately as Malyshevsky Urban Okrug, and the urban-type settlement of Reftinsky is incorporated separately as Reftinsky Urban Okrug.

Economy

Today's Asbest is a large industrial center.

Joint-stock company A joint-stock company (JSC) is a business entity in which shares of the company's stock can be bought and sold by shareholders. Each shareholder owns company stock in proportion, evidenced by their shares (certificates of ownership). Shareho ...

Uralasbest is the main industrial enterprise. The

chrysotile Chrysotile or white asbestos is the most commonly encountered form of asbestos, accounting for approximately 95% of the asbestos in the United StatesOccupational Safety and Health Administration, U.S. Department of Labor (2007)29 C.F.R.&nb ...

(asbestos) mine adjacent to the town is the subject of published, peer-reviewed scientific investigations about its detrimental health impact on the local population, and is said to be the world's largest. The adjacent

open-pit Open-pit mining, also known as open-cast or open-cut mining and in larger contexts mega-mining, is a surface mining technique that extracts rock (geology), rock or minerals from the earth. Open-pit mines are used when deposits of commercially ...

Uralasbest mine is said to be "seven miles (11 km) long and 1 to 1.5 miles (2.5 km) wide, (and) it is nearly half the size of

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

— and more than a thousand feet (300 meters) deep". Other factories include ''UralATI'', ''Zarechny'', ''Asbostroy'', ''Asbestovskaya'' poultry processing plant, and a ferroconcrete production factory.

Asbestos Asbestos ( ) is a group of naturally occurring, Toxicity, toxic, carcinogenic and fibrous silicate minerals. There are six types, all of which are composed of long and thin fibrous Crystal habit, crystals, each fibre (particulate with length su ...

brick A brick is a type of construction material used to build walls, pavements and other elements in masonry construction. Properly, the term ''brick'' denotes a unit primarily composed of clay. But is now also used informally to denote building un ...

porcelain Porcelain (), also called china, is a ceramic material made by heating Industrial mineral, raw materials, generally including kaolinite, in a kiln to temperatures between . The greater strength and translucence of porcelain, relative to oth ...

, furniture, metal constructions, and other products are produced in Asbest.

Education and recreation

The town is home to the ''Uralasbest'' stadium, which seats ten thousand people. Educational facilities include music schools, a school of art, an Olympic school, an institute of science and research, professional schools, and colleges of mining and economics. There are two museums: a geological museum and a museum of local lore.

History

Walter Arnold Rukeyser, an electrical engineer with extensive experience with asbestos in Quebec, worked in Asbest in 1929, and again in 1930. His memoir of his times there, "''Working for the Soviets ; an American engineer in Russia,''" was published in 1932 and reprinted in 1952. Following

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, the Soviet Union operated the

prisoner-of-war camp A prisoner-of-war camp (often abbreviated as POW camp) is a site for the containment of enemy fighters captured as Prisoner of war, prisoners of war by a belligerent power in time of war. There are significant differences among POW camps, inte ...

s 84 and 314 near Asbest. In addition, from May 1950 until April 1953, up to 7700 inmates were imprisoned in the Bazhenovsky ITL

gulag The Gulag was a system of Labor camp, forced labor camps in the Soviet Union. The word ''Gulag'' originally referred only to the division of the Chronology of Soviet secret police agencies, Soviet secret police that was in charge of runnin ...

. Inmates had to work for the local asbestos industry; more than 15,000 died due to the conditions, including asbestos-related diseases and lack of clean water.

References

Notes

Sources

* * *Kopyrin, Alexander Leonidovich (2012): Асбест. Куделька. Копи.

External links

Official website of Asbest

Directory of organizations in Asbest
{{Authority control Cities and towns in Sverdlovsk Oblast