High in the Ural Mountains, in the south-eastern corner of the Komi Republic, the Pechora River rises. It descends from the slopes, flows briefly south, then bends and turns north. The river then continues more or less in the northerly direction for some 1,800 km until it empties into the Arctic ocean.
To Soviet planners, this seemed like a colossal waste. Why should a river the size of the Pechora—the third-largest in Europe by annual discharge, after the Volga and the Danube—pour its waters into the Arctic when they could irrigate the parched lands of the south?
From that question sprang one of the most audacious engineering schemes of the 20th century.
Map of all major Siberian rivers. Credit: Steve Wiertz
Click Here to read more Amusing Planet
