#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. Drivers lived in cabins for weeks, and if the train was covered with snow, people walked to the nearest housing. Such a sledge-tractor train traveled a hundred-kilometer distance between Norilsk and Dudinka in an average of two weeks.
To “encourage and increase the tractor team’s work intensity”, premium-progressive wage was established: for the first two trips during the month they were paid in the usual way, for the third trip the payment was increased by 25 percent, for the fourth – by 50 percent. However, it is easy to calculate that it was very difficult to make more than two flights a month.
In the 1930s, transport links with other settlements were a little better. Postal horses traveled from Krasnoyarsk to Dudinka in 45 days. The voyage of steamships from Krasnoyarsk to Dudinka lasted 10 days, and back to Krasnoyarsk – 15. The voyage of an airplane in winter from Krasnoyarsk to Dudinka often lasted up to 36 days. The movement of aircraft was hampered by winds, blizzards, and the lack of landing sites.
In the History Spot’s previous publication, we said that the Putorana plateau owes its birth to a gigantic catastrophe.
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Text: Svetlana Ferapontova, Photo: Nornickel Polar Branch archive
