Climate of Russia

The climate of Russia is formed under the influence of several determining factors. The enormous size of the country and the remoteness of many areas from the sea result in the dominance of the continental climate, which is prevalent in European and Asian Russia except for the tundra and the extreme southwest. Mountains in the south obstructing the flow of warm air masses from the Indian Ocean and the plain of the west and north makes the country open to Arctic and Atlantic influences.^[1][2] Russia's climate, despite its enormous geographical extent, is generally warm to hot in the summer and cold to very cold in the winter, with snow cover typically present over the vast majority of the country's territory in the winter months, with the exception of the country's southernmost territories, the North Caucasus. Russia's far northeast, subject to an extreme subarctic climate, experiences the coldest winters of any permanently settled region in the world, with Yakutsk, the capital of the Sakha Republic, being the world's coldest major city and Oymyakon, also in the Sakha Republic, being the world's coldest permanently inhabited settlement.