November seems to be blowing hot and cold at bewildering speed, with another drop in temperature expected at the end of the week when polar air delivers a cold snap.

But things could be a lot worse. Oymyakon in eastern Siberia hit minus 47C (-52F) this week, several degrees below normal. Oymyakon is a village of several hundred people, and famed as the coldest permanently inhabited place on Earth. Temperatures there have plummeted to a record low of minus 71.2C (-96.2F), and earned the surrounding region the title of “The Pole of Cold”.

Water has to be delivered by tankers because pipes freeze. Cars and trucks are kept in heated garages because batteries go flat and diesel freezes solid at minus 50C (-58F). But fires are often lit beneath the fuel tanks to keep them from freezing, and because axle grease also freezes it is warmed with a blowtorch. Incredibly, people there believe in swimming outdoors in winter to avoid colds and pneumonia.

As yet tourism has made little impact on Oymyakon.

It is easy to assume that somewhere so cold must lie near the North Pole, but Oymyakon is actually placed well outside the Arctic Circle.

It lies in the middle of a large landmass far from the warming influence of the sea, where a vast swath of snow in winter helps to reflect heat. That blanket of snow helps to create a high pressure system that brings clear skies in, allowing heat to escape quickly into space. And Oymyakon also sits in a high valley surrounded by mountains that trap much of the cold.