A visit to the coldest town on Earth


Founded by Mongols in the time of Ghengis Kahn, the town of Oymyakon is the coldest permanently inhabited place on earth.

The village has a population of around 800 and is located 690 meters above sea level and lies in a valley between two mountain ranges (the reason for the low temperatures). The name Oymyakon means "non-freezing water" because of the natural hot spring close to the village.

The temperature this week is pretty low and the temperature tomorrow is a chilly -63C which based on the stats at Wikipedia equals the record low for December.

Mark Frauenfelder

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