Hammer and Sickle ornaments and the Soviet star are used as decoration around the town. The smell of papirosa, likely the strongest cigarette ever made, stains on the indoor walls.
#Glimpses ghost town arctic norwegian isle movie#
Best of all, it’s not an artificial scenery aimed for some kind of movie production. Walking in Pyramiden today gives you a glimpse into the Soviet-style nostalgia, outdoor as well as indoor.
(Thomas Nilsen/The Independent Barents Observer) The entrances to the coal mine are up in the mountain above the town. With that, only Norwegian and Soviet communities remained on the archipelago. The same year, a Norwegian state-owned company bought Svea coalmine from the Swedes. The Soviet Union bought Pyramiden in 1927 from the Swedes, just like its state company Arktikugol (Arctic coal) bought the Barentsburg coal mine further southwest in Isfjorden from the Dutch in 1934. In the 1920s, onshore, that meant coal mining. The 1920 Svalbard Treaty recognizes the sovereignty of Norway over the archipelago, but all signatories were given equal rights to engage in commercial activities on the islands. What could be taken out from beneath the permafrost inside the steep mountain, anyway, was just a tiny thousandth of the coal extracted in the Kuzbass region in southwestern Siberia.ĭigging for coal gave the Soviet Union a foothold on Svalbard. (Thomas Nilsen/The Independent Barents Observer)Īlthough not stated publicly, the Kremlin’s main idea with the settlement was not primarily to mine for coal. Operated by the Russians, but Svalbard is Norwegian land. A foothold on Svalbard Coal loading crane in the port of Pyramiden. This is a Soviet ghost town on Norway’s Svalbard archipelago that was once inhabited by Russian and Ukrainian coal miners and their families. Why the town was named Pyramiden? Well, take a look at the nearest mountain. High above the coal mines, the towering top of the mountain looks truly like a pyramid. The inspiration for the town’s name is easy to understand when looking up. Welcome to Pyramiden, or the Pyramid in English.
No, there aren’t any hidden loudspeakers playing The Beatles. Abandoned twenty years ago, Pyramiden, a coal-mining town on the northern edge of the world, is a preserved display of what the Soviet Union wanted to offer in the Arctic if communism worked. (Thomas Nilsen/The Independent Barents Observer) This was once home to the world’s northernmost kindergarten and primary school. Pyramiden is an abandoned Soviet town on Norway’s Svalbard archipelago, in the Arctic.
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