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Defense Mapping Agency topographical map of the Bering Strait, 1973. From at least 1562, European geographers thought that there was a Strait of Anián between Asia and North America. In 1648, Semyon Dezhnyov probably passed through the strait, but his report did not reach Europe. Danish-born Russian navigator Vitus Bering entered it in
Beringia sea levels (blues) and land elevations (browns) measured in metres from 21,000 years ago to present. Beringia is defined today as the land and maritime area bounded on the west by the Lena River in Russia; on the east by the Mackenzie River in Canada; on the north by 72° north latitude in the Chukchi Sea; and on the south by the tip of the Kamchatka Peninsula. [1]
The Bering Strait and Bering Sea separate the landmasses of Asia and North America, as well as forming the international boundary between Russia and the United States. This national and continental boundary separates the Diomede Islands in the Bering Strait, with Big Diomede in Russia and Little Diomede in the U.S.
Both Vitus Bering (in 1728) and James Cook (in 1778) entered the Bering Strait from the south and sailed some distance northwest, but from 1648 (Semyon Dezhnev) to 1879 (Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld) no one is recorded as having sailed eastward between the Kolyma and Bering Strait. Map drawn in 1601 by Theodore de Bry to describe the ill-fated ...
Bering's main goal was to discover a passage or strait between America and Asia. During Bering's first expedition he did not complete this goal. [4] Bering's deputy and successor, Alexi Chirkov or Aleksei Chirikov, was designated navigator of the expedition, as he was a Russian naval officer who had attended school for mathematics and ...
In 2008, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin approved the plan to build a railway to the Bering Strait area, as a part of the development plan to run until 2030. The more than 100-kilometer (60 mi) tunnel would have run under the Bering Strait between Chukotka, in the Russian far east, and Alaska. [31] The cost was estimated as $66 billion. [32]
Big Diomede Island is the easternmost point of Russia. The Diomede Islands are often mentioned as likely intermediate stops for the hypothetical bridge or tunnel (Bering Strait crossing) spanning the Bering Strait. [5] During winter, an ice bridge usually spans the distance between these two islands.
The first European to reach the islands was the Russian explorer Semyon Dezhnyov in 1648. Vitus Bering landed on the Diomede Islands on August 16, 1728, the day on which the Russian Orthodox Church celebrates the memory of the martyr St. Diomede. [4] In 1732, the Russian geodesist Mikhail Gvozdev plotted the island's map.