70 years since the Ust-Vilyuy gas field discovery in Yakutia

On 15 October 1956, a powerful natural gas fountain erupted from a well in Yakutia, marking the discovery of the Ust-Vilyuy gas field. Seventy years later, the find is remembered as the first gas field in Yakutia and the start of the region's modern gas industry.

The breakthrough came when Nikolai Yakovlev, a salt master at a state fish plant, noticed strong gas release in the Bergette channel and on Lake Eyyum and alerted the Yakutsk Geological Administration. Samples were tested in Yakutsk and Leningrad, and the site's potential was officially recorded in March 1952. In 2024, Russia's Ministry of Natural Resources posthumously named Yakovlev as the field's discoverer.

A settlement for gas workers, Promyshlenny, was built on the Vilyuy river about 9 km from its mouth on the Lena. Today Yakutia ranks among Russia's five leading oil and gas producing regions, supplying Asia-Pacific markets through the ESPO pipeline and the Power of Siberia gas pipeline.