Russia – 3 Rubles – 1995 – SI Chelyuskin – 1oz Silver Proof

3 Rubles – 1995 – SI Chelyuskin – 1oz Silver Proof

Details:
Country: Russia
Mint: St. Petersburg Mint (SMD)
Face value: 3 rubles
Quality: Proof
Metal: Silver
Fineness: 900/1000
Total weight: 34.88g
Fine weight: 31,10g
Diameter: 39.00mm
Thickness: 3.30mm
Circulation: 25.000

Front:
The double-headed eagle, the letters below indicate the metal mark, the fineness, the mint mark and the fine metal content. The inscriptions along the edge: above – «3 RUBLЯ 1995 г.» (3 RUBLES 1995), below – «БАНК РОССИИ» (BANK OF RUSSIA).

Back:
Top left – portraits of Russian Arctic explorers, participants of the Great Northern Expedition: Stepan Malygin, Dmitri Ovtsyn, Semyon Chelyuskin and Khariton and Dmitri Laptev, in the center right – a wooden sailing and rowing boat living on the coast, on the left – a dog harness with travelers, below – a map of the Siberian coast, on the right – two dates in two lines “1733-1743 гг.”. The inscriptions along the edge: above – “EXPLORATION OF THE RUSSIAN ARCTIC” (EXPLORATION OF THE RUSSIAN ARCTIC), below – “VELIKA Y SEVERNAYA EKSPEDICY” (THE GREAT NORTHERN EXPEDITION).

Information:
The Arctic, the northern polar part of the Earth, has always attracted brave sailors and naturalists, but its intensive exploration only began in the late 19th century. Important oceanological observations were made by Fridtjof Nansen’s expedition of Norwegian North Pole explorers on the sailing ship Fram (1893-1896) and the expedition of Roald Amundsen on the ship Mod (1918-1920). In 1926, the latter led the first flight from Spitsbergen over the North Pole to America with the airship Norway. The commander of the airship was the Italian engineer Umberto Nobile. In 1928, Nobile led the Italian expedition to the North Pole with the airship Italia, which broke apart and crashed. The Russian icebreaker Krasin joined the expedition to rescue Nobile and his team. In 1933, the Russians attempted to sail the steamship Chelyuskin (named after the 18th-century Russian North Pole explorer Semyon Chelyuskin) along the Northern Sea Route in a single voyage from Murmansk to Vladivostok. However, in February 1934, the ship was crushed by the ice of the Chuchche Sea and the expedition members were rescued by airplanes. In 1937, Russia built the first floating research station at the North Pole, North Pole-1, where Ivan Papanin, Yevgeny Fedorov, Petr Shirshov and Ernst Krenkel worked. In 1937, Russian pilots Valery Chkalov, Georgy Baidukov and Alexander Belyakov flew non-stop from Moscow over the North Pole to Vancouver.