Siberian Bounty island

Lying in the Novosibirsk Islands archipelago, no one knew of the existence of the tiny land mass until being spotted by Russian Air Force crews during a helicopter flight. Officials were originally planning to name it Bounty, because of its resemblance to the Pacific island uncovered by Marlon Brando in 1960 whilst shooting the movie Mutiny on the Bounty.

However it has now been called Yaya – the Russian word Ya means Me, or I in English – after crews debating who spotted the island first all said 'Ya, Ya' at the same time. Russia’s Ministry of Defence has now confirmed the land is part of the country after a scientific research vessel visited it last week.

Vesti state TV channel also reported: 'Russia got bigger by four hectares. It’s official'.

Yaya was first spotted in September last year by the crews of two MI26 helicopters under the command of Air Force Colonel Vladimir Rukavishnikov. They had been on a flight from Tikso to Kotelniy island, when they saw a small land mass not marked on maps, before chief pilot Alexander Matveev marked it on the GPS navigator.

A second flight was taken around the island in April with pictures taken, showing a distinctive lagoon in its middle.

This reminded crews of the Pacific island Teti’aroa, which was found by the actor Marlon Brando while scouting filming locations for Mutiny on the Bounty.

Once filming was completed on the neighbouring Tahiti, Brando had hired a local fisherman to ferry him back to the new island, later describing it as 'more gorgeous than anything I had anticipated'.

Sergey Rizhiy, a historian and geographer, told the Siberian Times that Russia’s newest piece of land was almost named after the island eventually bought by the Hollywood star. He said: 'The first idea was to name the island Bounty as it looks almost identical to the famous island, but when we began discussing who was the first to notice the island, everyone began saying ‘Ya, ya, ya!’

'This is how we decided to name it Yaya'.

The first manned expedition to Yaya took place on September 23, when it was visited by the Baltic research vessel Admiral Vladimirsky.

Already at sea conducting round-the-world scientific tasks, the crew had been asked to confirm whether the island in the East Siberian Sea actually existed.

Scientists studied photographs taken by the 1913 Hydrographic Expedition depicting a 15-metre high glacial island called Vasilyevsky, and believe it has melted down to form Yaya. The land mass stands less than one metre high, and amounts to about just 500 sq metres in size with the lagoon in the centre.

A research drill showed it is made up mainly of sand but, despite this and its small size, the experts predict it will exist for many years.

Indeed, with a considerably high amount of geological activity in the region some scientists say it may actually grow larger.