East Meets West

I was intrigued by Governor Palin's claim tonight in her interview with Charlie Gibson there are parts of Alakasa where you can see Russia. Turns out Palin's right!

I did some hard reporting on the subject, and learned something about a little American rock in the middle of the Bering Straight where you can (I guess) see a little Russian rock in the middle of the Bering Strait, which is 2.4 miles away.

Here you can learn about the American rock:

As of the census [17] of 2000, there were 146 people, 43 households, and 31 families residing in the city. The population density was 51.4 people per square mile (19.8/km²). There were 47 housing units at an average density of 16.5/sq mi (6.4/km²). The racial makeup of the city was 6.16% White, 92.47% Native American, and 1.37% from two or more races. Today there are about 30 buildings [19] in the island including the residential housing which were mainly built in 1970's and 1980's. Washeteria has been built to serve the community with a laundromat and showers.[20] Clinic for basic health care has been included within the washeteria. The island also has a school library, heliport and a satellite dish for TV, telephone, fax and internet. There is no bank nor restaurant and the only store in the island has its supplies mainly limited to some food, beverage, clothing, firearms, ammunition and fuel. Snacks, clothing, diapers and other items are often ordered from Anchorage Walmart and Kmart stores by mail or parcel.[21]... An electric system was built to the island in the 1970.... Water for winter use is drawn from a mountain spring, then treated and stored in 1650m³ (434,000 gallon) storage tank. Because the permafrost does not allow pipelines being installed under ground, residents carry water from the tank. Even with a tank this size, the water supply usually runs out by March, washeteria is closed and residents must melt their drinking water from snow and ice.

Little Diomede: frontier of freedom!

Best I can tell, the Russian rock has no population, but is possessed of the following geographic curiosity:

Big Diomede Island is Russia's easternmost point and despite being the western one of the two islands, it is located what is considered east on the map. In the same way, the Little Diomede Island, USA, despite of being eastern one of the two islands, is located what is considered west on the map. The confusion between the east and the west near the 180th meridian is due to the very definition of a geographic coordinate system. For geographical and political reasons, even if located on the 169th meridian west, Big Diomede Island is included in what we call the eastern part of the world. Yet further east than the Little Diomede Island, Alaska's Attu Island in the Aleutian Islands is the westernmost point of the United States even if located on the 173rd meridian east, also the westernmost point of the Earth."

Big Diomede: we will bury you!

Below: battlefield of the next (very, very, very) Cold War?

Views expressed on this page are those of the authors and not necessarily those of Campaign for America's Future or Institute for America's Future