Surgut, city in central Russia, in the central part of Khantia-Mansia, an autonomous okrug (national area) within Tyumen' Oblast (region). Surgut is located along the Ob' River in the West Siberian Plain. It is a major processing center of crude oil and natural gas extracted in the region, with a gas-processing plant and a motor fuel refinery. Other industries in Surgut produce prefabricated construction materials. The city also serves as an important transportation center with its large, mechanized river-port facility, all-weather airport, railroad junction, and oil pipeline. A railroad built in the 1980s linked the city to the gas field at Urengoy in the northeast. Surgut is the primary regional producer of energy, with two large thermal power plants that provide electric power to most of the oil and gas industries in western Siberia. Surgut has several educational institutions, including a branch of the Tyumen' Industrial Institute, a technical training institute, and a musical training center. A museum of regional history is also located there.
Surgut was first settled in 1593. In the 17th century it was part of the system of frontier fortresses that helped expand the Russian Empire into Siberia. From 1922 to 1991 it was part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). Because of the city's location in a region of important petroleum deposits, its development coincided with the major Soviet buildup of oil and gas industries in the 1970s and 1980s. The city experienced rapid population growth with an influx of workers who migrated to Surgut for employment. Its population more than tripled between 1970 and 1979, rising from about 34,000 to about 107,000. By 1989 it had reached about 248,000. Population (1995) 287,047.
