Pirallahı Island
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Pirallahı Island (Azeri: Pirallahı adası; formerly Artyom Island) is a settlement in the Caspian Sea, within the Azizbekov district of Baku. Flights to other rarely-seen Caspian isles are available at the heliport on the southern tip of the island. Oil deposits on the northern part of Pirallahi are estimated at 1.2 million tons[1].
[edit] History
Zoroastrians worshipped a fire at the low-lying island. In the Soviet era the island was named after Fyodor Sergeyev, nicknamed Artyom (previous island's name - Svyatoy, from Russian: Святой - "the Holy"). Off the northern tip of the island it is said that undersea booty lies offshore from a 1660 sea battle between Persians and Cossack explorer Stepan Razin[2].
The island is said to be the among the first places that oil was extracted in Azerbaijan and in the 1820s it was divided into two separate areas, one residential, and another where oil was refined into paraffin. In 1934 oil explorers dropped metal drills off piers from the island, considered an advancement in offshore oil exploration [3]. The old Artyom village was removed due to rising water levels on the Caspian Sea and residents moved to a series of apartment towers built by German prisoners in 1948.
