There are many inexplicable things in our world, but perhaps the most mysterious is the existence of long-forgotten and abandoned ghost towns: most of them appeared as a result of a large-scale or natural man-made disaster. We present you the top 10 dead cities in the world, which are almost wiped off the face of the earth, but have their own amazing history.

10. Badi (California)

The city was founded in 1876 as a settlement for gold miners, and in just 4 years of its existence, the number of inhabitants exceeded 10,000 people. However, the rapid depletion of resources forced the townspeople to leave their homes, and a fire in 1932 destroyed half of all buildings. Currently, the city has been given the status of a Historical Park, and anyone can walk along the empty streets.

9. San Zhi (Taiwan)

It was originally planned that this futuristic city would acquire the status of an elite and closed one and become the residence of rich people. However, all work had to be curtailed due to a series of fatal accidents that occurred to the workers. No one dared to demolish the "alien" houses, and many believe that the souls of the dead builders now live in them.

8. Varosha (Cyprus)

Once upon a time, numerous tourists came here to rest, but in 1974 the city was occupied by the Turkish army, as a result of which the locals were forced to leave their homes in a hurry, although many hoped to return, but in vain. Now Varosha looks like time has stopped in the city forever.

7. Gunkanjima (Japan)

This city also fell victim to mineral hunters. It is located on a small beautiful island, which was bought by Mitsubishi in 1890. Large-scale coal mining works were launched here. Soon the density of the working population reached a record high - 835 people per 1 ha. But when gasoline replaced coal in the middle of the 20th century, the company began to suffer losses and had to curtail its activities. The city was deserted, and today the penetration into its territory is equated with a criminal offense.

6. Balestrino (Italy)

It is still not known for certain how this city was formed. The first mention of it dates back to 1860. Then only about 850 people lived here, who were engaged in farming and olive oil production. An earthquake that occurred at the end of the 19th century forced the townspeople to leave the city and move to safer places in terms of geological stability.

5. Centralia (Pennsylvania)

The city flourished until the middle of the 19th century. It was the center of anthracite coal mining, but after the parent companies went out of business, there was no one to control the deposits. The consequence of such “negligence” is an underground fire that could not be extinguished for several decades, and only in 1981 the authorities decided to evacuate the residents. The fire has not yet died out, and according to experts, this process may drag on for another 250 years.

4. Yashima (Japan)

It was supposed that this city would become the tourist center of Japan: it is located on the top of a picturesque plateau, and here was once the Shikoku Monastery, which was a favorite place for many pilgrims. But, as practice has shown, he was of little interest to a European traveler, and all the good things remained useless to anyone.

3. Agdam (Azerbaijan)

The name of this city was familiar to every lover of strong drinks during the existence of the Soviet Union. Once it bore the proud name "White Dome", and now it is called the "Caucasian Hiroshima". Agdam today is a kind of monument to a stupid and cruel war on the territory of the proud, but unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh.

2. Neftegorsk (Russia)

May 28, 1995. Sakhalin was shaken by a powerful 10-magnitude earthquake that claimed the lives of more than 2,000 people and destroyed a small industrial town, simply wiping it off the face of the Earth. It was decided not to restore Neftegorsk, and today only plates with numbers carved on them remind of the location of the destroyed houses.

1. Pripyat (Ukraine)

Probably, there is no person who has not heard about the Chernobyl tragedy. This beautiful and promising city turned out to be the youngest ghost town. Now the population of Pripyat is 0 people, but everyone can sign up for a full-fledged excursion, and there are many of them.

Pripyat began to build in February 1970. In 1972, the settlement was given a name - in honor of the river on which it was built - Pripyat. On August 15, 1972, in a solemn ceremony, the first cubic meter of concrete was laid in the base of the main building of the power plant. Together with the commissioning of the first facilities at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the first residential buildings were built. The status of the city of Pripyat was acquired in 1979. In the mid-1980s, about 48,000 people lived there.

At 01:23:47 on Saturday, April 26, 1986, an explosion occurred at the 4th power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, which completely destroyed the reactor. The building of the power unit partially collapsed, killing two people. A fire broke out in various rooms and on the roof. Subsequently, the remnants of the core melted, a mixture of molten metal, sand, concrete and fuel fragments spread over the under-reactor rooms. As a result of the accident, radioactive substances were released into the environment, including isotopes of uranium, plutonium, iodine-131, cesium-134, cesium-137, strontium-90.

On April 27, 36 hours after the explosion at the fourth reactor, the announcer of the Pripyat radio broadcasting network announced the gathering and temporary evacuation of the city's residents.

On April 28, 1986, at 21:00, TASS broadcast a brief informational message: “An accident occurred at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. One of the nuclear reactors was damaged. Measures are being taken to eliminate the consequences of the accident. Assistance is provided to the victims. A government commission has been set up to investigate the incident.”

This young city was a major transport hub; construction was actively going on in Pripyat. They built the cinema "Prometheus", the house of culture "Energetik", the hotel "Polesye", the palace of pioneers, sports complexes, a park of culture. The city was exemplary, foreign delegations were brought here to show how the Soviet people live. Now the deserted city is heavily overgrown with greenery. Public interest in Pripyat only grows over the years, and excursions are regularly held there.

2 Kadykchan

Kadykchan is the most famous of the abandoned villages of the Magadan region. The settlement was built after the highest quality coal was found there in 1943 at a depth of 400 meters. As a result, the Arkagalinskaya CHPP operated at the Kadykchansky coal and supplied electricity to 2/3 of the Magadan Region. As of January 1986, 10,270 people lived in the village.

The population of Kadykchan began to decline rapidly after the explosion at the mine in 1996, when it was decided to close the village. A few years later, the only local boiler house stopped working, after which it became impossible to live in Kadykchan. By this time, about 400 people lived in the village, refusing to leave.

3 Gankajima

Off the west coast of Japan is the dead island of Gankajima (also called Hashima or Hashima). For a long time it was nothing more than a small reef. But in 1810, the accidental discovery of coal changed the fate of this reef decisively. Mitsubishi bought Gankajima and began mining coal from the bottom of the sea. The work required significant labor costs and manpower. Construction began, people arrived to live and work here. Thanks to the coal industry, housing estates began to expand continuously.

By the middle of the 20th century, the population density on the island was 835 people per hectare. The reef has turned into an artificial island with a diameter of about one kilometer, with a population of 5300 people. From the ocean, the silhouette of the island resembled a ship of the line.

Over time, coal was replaced by oil, and the coal fields began to close. In 1974, one of the most populous islands in the world became completely deserted. Mitsubishi has officially announced the closure of the field. Currently, visiting the island is prohibited.

4 Centralia

In the middle of the 19th century, a settlement called Centerville appeared on the map of the United States, in Pennsylvania. In 1865 it was renamed Centralia. And in 1866, Centralia received the status of a city. The coal-anthracite industry was the main production here. For most of the history of this town, while the coal industry was functioning, the population was more than 2,000 inhabitants. About 500-600 more people lived in the suburbs, in the immediate vicinity of Centralia.

In May 1962, the city council hired volunteer firefighters to clean up the city's rubbish dump, located in an abandoned open-pit mine pit. Firefighters set fire to the rubbish heaps, allowing them to burn for a while, and then extinguished them. But the fire was not completely extinguished. Deeper deposits of debris began to smolder, and eventually the fire spread through a hole in the shaft to other abandoned coal mines near Centralia. Over time, people began to complain about the deterioration of health, provoked by the release of carbon monoxide.

In 1979, locals learned the true extent of the problem when a gas station owner inserted a dipstick into one of the underground tanks to check the fuel level. When he took out the dipstick, it was very hot - the temperature of the gasoline in the tank was about 78 ° C.

Attention to the fire culminated in 1981 when a 12-year-old boy fell into an earthen well 1.2 meters wide and 45 meters deep, which suddenly opened up under his feet. The boy was saved by his older brother. The incident quickly drew national attention to Centralia. In 1984, Congress appropriated more than $42 million to prepare and organize the resettlement of citizens. Most of the residents accepted this offer and moved to the neighboring settlements of Mount Carmel and Ashland. Several families decided to stay, despite warnings from government officials. In 1992, the State of Pennsylvania requested a permit for the eminent domain of all private property in the city, arguing that the buildings were unusable.

5 Oradour-sur-Glane

The village of Oradour-sur-Glan in 1944 turned into a ghost - the Nazis shot and burned 642 of its inhabitants in one day, and then set fire to the village itself. Among the dead were 207 children and 245 women.

Soldiers of the 2nd SS Panzer Division "Reich" under the command of General Heinz Lammerding, on their way from Toulouse to the Normandy front, surrounded Oradour on 10 June. Under the pretext of checking documents, they herded the inhabitants to the market square and demanded that the fugitives be handed over to them, including residents of Alsace and Lorraine, who allegedly hid in the village from the German authorities. The head of the administration refused to give them up, deciding to sacrifice himself and, if necessary, his family. However, the Nazis did not manage to do this. They herded the men into barns and machine-gunned them. The bodies were covered with straw and burned. The soldiers locked the women and children in the church. First, asphyxiating gas was let into the building, and then the church was set on fire. Five men and one woman survived.

The massacre in Oradour-sur-Glane, which never resisted the invaders, became a symbol of Nazi barbarism. The ruins of the village were included in the list of historical monuments of France in 1945, and a new one was later built near the old Oradour.

6 Kolmanskop

The city of Kolmanskop is located in the Namib Desert, 10 kilometers from Lüderitz (Namibia) and the Atlantic coast. The city was formed thanks to the diamond rush.

In April 1908, Zacarias Leval, an employee of the Lüderitz-Ketmanshoop railway, saw diamonds right on the surface of the sandy desert, just 7 kilometers from Lüderitz. Zacarias gave the find to foreman August Stauch, who immediately realized what was happening.

Without attracting undue attention, Stauch hastened to stake out vast areas along a narrow saddle in the dolomite ridge near Lüderitz. Along this peculiar corridor, the wind carried sand from the southern part of the Namib Desert adjacent to the mouth of the Orange, further north. There, small diamonds, carried by the river into the ocean, and then thrown ashore by the surf, were carried along with the sand.

A city quickly sprang up in this place. Large beautiful houses, a school, and a hospital were built in Kolmanskop. The inhabitants counted on long-term prosperity in the diamond city. But the flow of diamonds quickly dried up. Life in Kolmanskop was difficult due to sandstorms and lack of drinking water. And ten years after its foundation, a mass exodus of local residents began. Now most of the houses are almost completely covered with sand.

7 Varosha

Varosha is a quarter in the city of Famagusta in Cyprus. Until 1974, it was a popular tourist destination, and then became a "ghost town".

In the 1970s, Famagusta was the main tourist center in Cyprus. Due to the growing number of tourists in the city, many new hotels and tourist facilities have been built, and there are especially many of them in Varosha. Between 1970 and 1974, the city was at the height of its popularity. Varosha hosted many modern hotels, and its streets were home to a large number of entertainment venues, bars, restaurants and nightclubs.

On July 20, 1974, the Turkish army invaded Cyprus in response to a political coup in the country, and on August 15 of the same year, the Turks occupied Famagusta. As a result of these actions, the country was split into two parts: Greek and Turkish. The Greeks living in Varosha were ordered to leave the city within a day, taking with them only what they could carry on themselves, and since then they have been forbidden to return to the quarter.

Shortly after the closure, the quarter was looted first by the Turkish military, who took furniture, televisions and utensils to the mainland, and then by residents of nearby streets, who carried away everything that was left.

Unlike many other places in Cyprus where the abandoned houses of the Greeks were occupied by their Turkish neighbors or migrants from Turkey, the Turks from Famagusta did not settle in Varosha. The Turkish army surrounded the deserted village with a barbed wire fence, checkpoints and various other barriers, effectively mothballing Varosha.

On our planet, there are a huge number of ghost towns, empty and creepy, frightening a traveler who accidentally wandered here, with empty eye sockets of windows of rickety buildings ...
In this ranking, we will present the 10 most famous abandoned cities abandoned by people for various reasons: some were abandoned due to bloody wars, others were abandoned under the onslaught of almighty nature.

1. The city of Kolmanskop, buried in the sands (Namibia)

Kolmanskop

Kolmanskop is an abandoned town in southern Namibia, located a few kilometers from the port of Lüderitz.
In 1908, Zakaris Leval, an employee of the railway company, discovered small diamonds in the sand. This discovery caused a real diamond rush and thousands of people rushed to the hot sands of the Namib Desert, hoping to make a fortune.

Kolmanskop was built in record time. It took people only two years to erect beautiful German-style residential buildings in the desert, rebuild a school, a hospital, and even a casino. But the city's days were already numbered.

After the end of the First World War, the cost of diamonds on the world market fell, and every year the production of precious stones in the mines of Kolmanskop became worse and worse. The lack of drinking water and the constant struggle with the sand dunes made the life of the people of the mining town increasingly unbearable.

In the 1950s, the last inhabitants left Kolmanskop and it turned into another ghost town on the world map. Soon, nature and the desert almost completely buried the town under the sand dunes. A few more old houses and the theater building remained unburied, which is still in good condition.

2. City of nuclear scientists Pripyat (Ukraine)

Pripyat is an abandoned city in the "exclusion zone" in northern Ukraine. Workers and scientists of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant lived here until the tragic day - April 26, 1986. On this day, the explosion of the 4th power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant put an end to the further existence of the city.

On April 27, the evacuation of people from Pripyat began. Nuclear workers and their families were allowed to take with them only the most necessary things and documents, all the property acquired over the years, people left in their abandoned apartments. Over time, Pripyat turned into a ghost town, visited only by extreme and thrill-seekers.

For those who want to see and appreciate the full scale of the disaster, the Pripyat-Tour company provides excursions to an abandoned city. Due to the high level of radiation, you can safely stay here for no more than a few hours, and most likely, Pripyat will forever remain a dead city.

3 Futuristic San Zhi Resort City (Taiwan)

In the north of Taiwan, not far from the capital of the state, the city of Taipei, there is a ghost town of San Zhi. According to the idea of ​​the developers, very wealthy people should have bought these houses, because the very architecture of the buildings, made in a futuristic style, was so unusual and revolutionary that it should have attracted a large number of wealthy customers.

But during the construction of the city, inexplicable accidents began to occur here, and every week there were more and more of them, until the death of workers began to happen every day. Rumor quickly spread the news of a bad city, which had a very bad effect on the reputation of the city for the rich.

The construction was finally completed and even a grand opening was held, but none of the potential customers bought a home here. Massive advertising campaigns and huge discounts did not help, Sang Chih became the new ghost town. Now access is prohibited here, and local residents believe that the city is inhabited by the ghosts of people who died here.

4. The medieval city of Craco (Italy)

About forty kilometers from the Gulf of Taranto in Italy, is the abandoned ancient city of Krako. Situated on picturesque hills, it was the patrimony of farmers and plowmen, its inhabitants were engaged in agriculture, growing wheat and other crops.

The first mention of the city dates back to 1060, when the entire land was owned by the Catholic Archbishop Arnaldo.
In 1981, the population of Krako was just over 2,000 people, and since 1982, due to poor harvests, landslides and constant landslides, the population of the town began to decline rapidly. Between 1892 and 1922, more than 1,300 people left Kracko. Some left to seek happiness in America, others settled in neighboring towns and villages.

The city was finally abandoned after a strong earthquake in 1963, only a few residents remained to while away their lives in the new ghost town. By the way, it was here that Mel Gibson filmed the scene of the execution of Judas for his masterpiece film The Passion of the Christ.

5. The village of Oradour-sur-Glan (France) - a memorial reminiscent of the horrors of fascism

The small ruined village of Oradour-sur-Glan in France stands as a reminder of the monstrous atrocities of the Nazis. During World War II, 642 villagers were brutally murdered by the Nazis as punishment for the capture of SS-Sturmbannführer Helmut Kampf by French resistance fighters.

According to one version, the Nazis simply confused the villages with consonant names.
A high-ranking fascist was in captivity in the neighboring village of Oradur-sur-Vaires. The Germans did not spare anyone - neither the elderly, nor women, nor children ... They drove the men to the sheds, where they accurately beat their legs with machine guns, then doused them with a combustible mixture and set them on fire.

Women, children and old people were locked in the church, then a powerful incendiary device was blown up. People tried to get out of the burning building, but they were mercilessly shot by German machine gunners. Then the Nazis completely destroyed the village.

6. Forbidden Island Gankanjima (Japan)

Gankanjima Island is one of the 505 uninhabited islands in Nagasaki Prefecture, and is located only 15 km from Nagasaki itself. It is also called Battleship Island because of the walls that protect the city from the sea. The history of the settlement of the island began in 1890, when coal was discovered here. Mitsubishi bought the entire area and began to implement a project to extract coal from the bottom of the sea.

In 1916, the first large concrete building was built on the island, and then the buildings began to grow like mushrooms after the rain. And in 1959, the population of the island grew so much that 835 people lived here on one hectare! It was a world record for population density.

In the early 1960s, oil in Japan increasingly began to displace coal in production, its extraction became unprofitable. Coal mines began to close all over the country, and the mines of Gankanjima were no exception.

In 1974, Mitsubishi officially announced the closure of the mines and the cessation of all activities on the island. Gankanjima has become another abandoned ghost town. Currently, visiting the island is prohibited, and in 2003, the famous Japanese action movie Battle Royale was filmed here.

7. Kadykchan - a village in the Magadan region

Kadykchan is an urban-type settlement located in the Susumansky district of the Magadan region. One of the most famous abandoned northern villages on the Internet. In 1986, according to the census, 10,270 people lived here, and in 2002 - only 875. In Soviet times, coal of the highest quality was mined here, which was used to heat almost 2/3 of the Magadan region.

The population of Kadykchan began to decrease rapidly after the mine explosion in 1996. A few years later, the only boiler house heating the village also thawed, and it became simply impossible to live here.

Now it's just a ghost town, one of many in Russia. There are rusty cars in the garages, destroyed furniture, books and children's toys in the rooms. Finally, leaving the dying village, the inhabitants shot the bust of V.I. Lenin installed on the square.

8. The walled city of Kowloon (Hong Kong) - a city of lawlessness and anarchy

One of the most incredible ghost towns that no longer exist is the city of Kowloon, which was located near the former Kaitak Airport, a city where all the vices and base passions of mankind were embodied. In the 1980s, more than 50,000 people lived here.
Probably, there was no longer a place on the planet where prostitution, drug addiction, gambling and underground workshops were ubiquitous.

It was practically impossible to take a step here without running into a drug addict pumped up with dope, or a prostitute who offered her services for a pittance. The authorities of Hong Kong practically did not control the city, there was the highest crime rate in the country.

Eventually, in 1993, the entire population of Kowloon was evicted and briefly became a ghost town. The incredible and creepy settlement was then demolished, and a park of the same name was laid out in its place.

9. The abandoned ghost town of Varosha (Cyprus)

Varosha is a district of Famagusta, a city in Northern Cyprus founded in the 3rd century AD. Until 1974, Varosha was a real "Mecca" for beach lovers. Thousands of tourists from all over the world flocked here to soak up the gentle rays of the Cypriot sun. They say that the Germans and the British booked places in luxury hotels for 20 years ahead!

The resort prospered, building up with new hotels and villas, until everything changed in 1974. That year, the Turks invaded Varosha with NATO support to protect the Turkish minority of Cypriot residents from persecution of ethnic Greeks.

Since then, the Varosha quarter has become a ghost town, surrounded by barbed wire, where the Turkish military has not let anyone in for four decades. The houses are dilapidated, the windows are shattered, and the streets of the once bustling quarter are in total ruin. Apartments and shops are empty and completely looted first by the Turkish military and then by local looters.

10. The Lost City of Agdam (Azerbaijan)

Agdam, a city that was once famous for its wine throughout the Soviet Union, is now dead and uninhabited... The war in Nagorno-Karabakh, which lasted from 1990 to 1994, did not give a chance to exist to the flat city, where excellent cheese was previously brewed and the best port wine in the Union.
The collapse of the USSR led to the outbreak of hostilities in many former republics.

Azerbaijan did not escape this either, the fighters of which were able to seize wagons with rockets located not far from Aghdam. It turned out to be very convenient for them to bomb the Armenian Stepanakert. Such actions eventually led to a sad ending.

In the summer of 1993, Agdam was surrounded by 6,000 soldiers of the Liberation Army of Nagorno-Karabakh. With the support of helicopters and tanks, the Armenians practically wiped out the hated city, and the approaches to it were carefully mined. Therefore, until now, visiting the ghost town of Agdam is not safe for life.

Russia's Most Frightening Ghost Towns!

Khalmer-Yu (Komi Republic)

In the 40s, a coal deposit was found here, but attempts to establish a full-fledged settlement here were unsuccessful until 1957. Then a serious material base appeared here and the village began to grow, turning into a city with a population of seven thousand people.


In 1993, the mine was closed, people were resettled in Vorkuta, and now there is a landfill on the site of an abandoned city. It was he who was used in 2005 to demonstrate the power of the Tu-160 to Vladimir Putin. Then the president was the co-pilot aboard a strategic bomber and fired a missile at one of the Halmer-Yu buildings.

Mologa (Yaroslavl region)



Not far from Rybinsk is the ghost town of Mologa. Once it was one of the largest shopping centers in Rus' (the city was founded in the XII century).


But in 1935, the Soviet authorities ordered the construction of the Rybinsk hydroelectric complex, and Mologa was simply flooded. People began to be resettled, and those who remained died. The city has sunk under water, and now, when the level is lowering, some buildings are visible.

Kursha-2 (Ryazan region)



The city of Kursha-2 was founded at the beginning of the 20th century in the Ryazan region. People came here from all over Russia to take part in the large-scale development of forest areas. In the early 1930s, more than a thousand people settled here, but soon almost all of them died. On August 3, 1936, a fire engulfed the entire city - only a few survived. Now near the burnt settlement there is a huge mass grave. The city itself is now completely destroyed, not a soul on the streets.

Kolendo (Sakhalin region)



In the early 60s, the development of an oil and gas field began in the very north of Sakhalin. People from all over the island began to come here, and by 1979 more than two thousand people settled here.


Until 1995, everything was in order, but there was a powerful earthquake, after which the reserves of natural resources were greatly reduced, and people began to leave the settlement en masse. Now no one lives there.

Industrial (Komi Republic)



The city was founded in the 50s. All buildings were erected by prisoners, and until the 90s more than 10 thousand people lived here. Life here stopped after the explosion in the Central mine. Overnight, all the workers here turned out to be useless. Families began to move to other settlements, and soon Industrial turned into a ghost town.

Neftegorsk (Sakhalin region)



Another victim of the 1995 earthquake was the city of Neftegorsk. Here the level of tremors reached 10 points. More than two thousand people died. The authorities evacuated the survivors, and now Neftegorsk is empty. Its streets still resemble a bombed-out town - only ruins...

Charonda (Vologda region)



In the city of Charonda on the shores of Lake Vozhe, 11 thousand people once lived. Once upon a time, life was seething here, but at the beginning of the 19th century, all trade routes that passed through Charonda ceased to exist, and the city turned into a village where only old people live.

Kadychkan (Magadan region)



In 1943, large deposits of coal were found in the Magadan region. Near one of these was founded the city of Kadychkan. Of course, this settlement was built, as they say, on the bones of prisoners who were exiled here by the thousands. Nevertheless, the city continued to develop, and after the thaw, in 1986, its population was 10 thousand people.


Extinction began in 1996 after a terrible accident at a mine, where more than a thousand miners died from an explosion. After that, the city was almost completely empty, and in 2003, by order of the authorities, the last residents were taken out of here and settled in other cities. Now the village is empty.

Iultin (Chukotka Autonomous Okrug)



The settlement was founded thanks to the tin deposit found here. People have been coming here since the 1950s. Houses were built here, families settled down, but in the 90s the enterprise went bankrupt and people began to leave the village. In 1995, no one was left in Iultne.

Yubileiny (Perm Territory)



The settlement was built by miners. The miners of the "Shumikhinsky" mine developed the city from the 50s to the 90s. Then the enterprise was reduced by half, and those who were left without work were forced to either change their profession or leave. The city quickly emptied and soon turned into another ghost. Now it is hard to imagine that life was once in full swing here.