Ukhta

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A view from the West

Ukhta (Russian: Ухта), also spelled Uchta, is an important industrial city in the Komi Republic of northwestern Russia. Population: 103,340 (2002 Census).

Oil springs along Ukhta river was already known in the seventeenth century. In the middle of XIX century industrialist Sidorov M.K. drilled for oil. It was one of the first oil wells in Russia. There was homecraft oil-field in 1920-21 years in Ukhta. Lying on the river of the same name, the settlement was founded as the village of Chibyu in 1929, but in 1939 it was renamed Ukhta. It received the town status in 1943 when it was linked to the Pechora Railway. To the east of the city is Sosnogorsk, and to the southwest Yarega. As well as its rail link Ukhta also has an airport.

Ukhta lies within the Pechora River basin, an important oil and gas-producing region. The oilfields lie just south of the city. Some of the Ukhta's oil is refined locally; most, however, is piped to oil refineries between St. Petersburg and Moscow. There were a few gas pipeline explosions at a distance of five miles from the town since 1990s.

The city expanded in the 1940s and 1950s by use of political prisoners' forced labour.