A plane carrying the 12 researchers arrived to a waiting crowd of family, friends and colleagues in Russia's second city of Saint Petersburg shortly after 2:00 p.m. (1100 GMT), Russian news agencies reported.

The scientists arrived from Norway's Spitzbergen island, to which rescue helicopters had airlifted them the previous day from their North Pole-32 floating station, some 700 kilometers (435 miles) away in the Nansen Basin.

"It was difficult of course because 90 percent of the station was destroyed but we had food and everything else we needed," Vladimir Kochelev, the head of the research station told the NTV television station upon arrival.

"We knew we would be rescued in time," a visibly fit Kochelev added as he descended from the airplane that flew him home along with his 12 other colleagues, none of whom was injured.

"We stayed in contact with rescuers and exchanged messages with them every three hours," he said.

Although the scientists' fate had riveted Russians for days after reports that most of the station disappeared in a scenario reminiscent of a Holloywood disaster movie, Sunday's focus was on the crew's accomplishments in 10 months atop the drifting ice.

"After a 12-year break, Russia has been able to again establish a year-long scientific drifting station atop Arctic ice," Artur Chilingarov, a deputy parliament speaker and former polar explorer who led the rescue mission, was quoted as saying on arriving in Saint Petersburg by the ITAR-TASS news agency.

North Pole-32 was Russia's first permanent research station in the Arctic since the Soviet Union fell apart in 1991.

Most of its installations sank overnight Wednesday when the ice below it cracked, rose up swiftly in great walls and eventually disintegrated.

None of the 12 scientists was hurt, and they and the two dogs on their team took shelter in the two houses that did not sink into the freezing waters.

The researchers, all experienced polar hands, spent three days in the structures waiting to be rescued as outside temperatures hovered around minus 30 degrees Celsius (minus 22 degrees Fahrenheit).

Station chief Vladimir Koshelyev told Russian television earlier in the week that most of North Pole-32 was engulfed by ice in only half an hour.

"All of a sudden ... a huge wall of ice appeared that kept growing and growing," he said.

"First it was three meters (10 feet) high, then five, then seven and finally over 10. ... In the course of a half hour it practically swallowed up 90 percent of the station, leaving only two small houses."

The station, set up in April 2003 to study climate change, has travelled some 3,000 kilometers (1,800 miles) atop the ice floes since then. The station had been due to complete its work by March 20.

TERRA.WIRE