Sredny Ostrov is a small island ('ostrov') and a military airfield in
Krasnoyarsk Krai
Krasnoyarsk Krai (, ) is a federal subjects of Russia, federal subject (a krai) of Russia located in Siberia. Its administrative center is the types of inhabited localities in Russia, city of Krasnoyarsk, the second-largest city in Siberia after ...
,
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 in the northern
Kara Sea
The Kara Sea is a marginal sea, separated from the Barents Sea to the west by the Kara Strait and Novaya Zemlya, and from the Laptev Sea to the east by the Severnaya Zemlya archipelago. Ultimately the Kara, Barents and Laptev Seas are all ...
, off the archipelago of
Severnaya Zemlya
Severnaya Zemlya (, ) is a archipelago in the Russian high Arctic. It lies off Siberia's Taymyr Peninsula, separated from the mainland by the Vilkitsky Strait. This archipelago separates two marginal seas of the Arctic Ocean, the Kara Sea i ...
and almost 900 km north of
Khatanga which in turn is on the Siberian coast. Sredny is an ice airfield used as an alternate field for
Tupolev Tu-95
The Tupolev Tu-95 (; NATO reporting name: "Bear") is a large, four-engine turboprop-powered strategic bomber and missile platform. Maiden flight, First flown in 1952, the Tu-95 entered service with the Soviet Long Range Aviation, Long-Range Avia ...
("Bear") bombers in the Arctic. It was built in the late 1950s as a staging base for Soviet
Long Range Aviation bombers to reach the United States, and was maintained by OGA (Arctic Control Group), which was a caretaker agency for strategic facilities in the Arctic. In March 1979 2
Tu-128
The Tupolev Tu-28 (NATO reporting name Fiddler) is a long-range interceptor aircraft introduced by the Soviet Union in the 1960s. The official designation was Tu-128, but this designation was less commonly used in the West. It was the largest a ...
(Fiddler) aircraft were based here. The airfield is believed to be operational, operated by Frontier Guards (FSB) and capable of servicing
An-26
The Antonov An-26 (NATO reporting name: Curl) is a twin-engined turboprop civilian and military transport aircraft, designed and produced in the Soviet Union from 1969 to 1986.Gordon, Yefim. Komissarov, Dmitry & Sergey. "Antonov's Turboprop Twins ...
and
An-72
The Antonov An-72 (NATO reporting name: Coaler) is a Soviet transport aircraft, developed by Antonov. It was designed as a STOL transport and intended as a replacement for the Antonov An-26, but variants have found success as commercial freigh ...
aircraft (it was in use as of January 2000, when an expedition bound for the North Pole recorded being flown there from Khatanga).
[ Ola Skinnarmo, ''Kampen mot Nordpolen'', Stockholm N-förlaget 2000,; ch.1]
References
Russian Air Force bases
Soviet Long Range Aviation bases
Airports built in the Soviet Union
Airports in Krasnoyarsk Krai
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