Short answers, pulled from the story.
Novaya Zemlya stretches across the Arctic Ocean in extreme northeast Europe. Cape Flissingsky marks the easternmost point of the European continent on this landmass. The archipelago consists of two main islands separated by the narrow Matochkin Strait.
Russian hunters from Novgorod visited the area as early as the 11th century. Hugh Willoughby became the first Western European to reach these shores in 1553. Dutch explorer Willem Barentsz arrived at the west coast during his expedition in 1594.
Convoy PQ 17 departed Iceland on the 27th of June 1942 with thirty-six merchant ships carrying heavy cargo. German U-boats detected the convoy on July 2 and began torpedo bomber attacks immediately. Several ships sought safety within the Matochkin Strait near Novaya Zemlya.
Novaya Zemlya became the designated nuclear weapons testing venue in July 1954. Over its history as a test site, the islands witnessed 224 nuclear explosions totaling 265 megatons of TNT equivalent. The last atmospheric test occurred in 1990 marking the end of Soviet Union-wide testing.
About 50 to 300 Nenets people lived on the islands from 1872 until the 1950s. They subsisted through fishing, trapping, reindeer herding, polar bear hunting, and seal hunting. The entire civilian population transferred to the mainland in 1957 before nuclear testing commenced.