Muostakh Island also spelled "Mostakh", is an island in the Buor-Khaya Gulf

Buor-Khaya Gulf

The Buor-Khaya Gulf or Buor-Khaya Bight is one of the most important gulfs of the Laptev Sea. It is located between the eastern side of the Lena delta on its western side and Cape Buor-Khaya at its NE end....

 of the Laptev Sea

Laptev Sea

The Laptev Sea is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. It is located between the northern coast of Siberia, the Taimyr Peninsula, Severnaya Zemlya and the New Siberian Islands. Its northern boundary passes from the Arctic Cape to a point with co-ordinates of 79°N and 139°E, and ends at the Anisiy...

. It is located off the eastern side of the Lena delta

Lena River

The Lena is the easternmost of the three great Siberian rivers that flow into the Arctic Ocean . It is the 11th longest river in the world and has the 9th largest watershed...

, enclosing the Tiksi Bay, about 35 km ESE of Tiksi

Tiksi

Tiksi is an urban locality and the administrative center of Bulunsky District of the Sakha Republic, Russia, situated on the Arctic Ocean coast. Population: It is one of the principal ports for accessing the Laptev Sea...

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Muostakh Island is long and narrow; its length is 13 km and its maximum breadth about 0.5 km on average. Off its southern tip lies a much smaller 2 km long island of similar characteristics.
The area where Muostakh Island lies, is subject to severe Arctic weather with frequent gales and blizzards. The sea in the bay is frozen for about nine months every year and often clogged with ice floes.

Administratively Muostakh Island belongs to the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) of the Russian Federation. There is a weather and biological research station in Muostakh Island.

Heavy erosion

Geologically Muostakh Island is the remainder of an ancient great plain that was part of the Siberian continental about two thousand years ago. The strait which now separates the island from the mainland was just beginning to form at that time.
Nowadays its northern landhead is subject to spectacular sea erosion, receding at a rate of 6 m a year. Sometimes the receding coastline exposes the bones and tusks of prehistoric animals like mammoth

Mammoth

A mammoth is any species of the extinct genus Mammuthus. These proboscideans are members of Elephantidae, the family of elephants and mammoths, and close relatives of modern elephants. They were often equipped with long curved tusks and, in northern species, a covering of long hair...

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