The Bering Strait has been the subject of the scientific theory that humans migrated from Asia to North America across a land bridge known as Beringia when lower ocean levels – a result of glaciers locking up vast amounts of water – exposed a wide stretch of the sea floor,[1] both at the present strait and in the shallow sea north and south of it.

[2][3] The strait is a unique habitat sparsely populated by the Yupik, Inuit, and Chukchi people who have cultural and linguistic ties to each other.

[5] In March 1913, Captain Max Gottschalk (German) crossed from the east cape of Siberia to Shishmaref, Alaska, on dogsled via Little and Big Diomede islands.

[6] In 1987, swimmer Lynne Cox swam a 4.3-kilometer (2.7 mi) course between the Diomede Islands from Alaska to the Soviet Union in 3.3 °C (37.9 °F) water during the last years of the Cold War.

[7][8] She was congratulated jointly by American President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.

The groups were: seven Alaskans, who called their effort Paddling Into Tomorrow (i.e. crossing the international dateline); a four-man British expedition, Kayaks Across the Bering Strait; and a team of Californians in a three-person baidarka, led by Jim Noyes (who launched his ambitious expedition as a paraplegic).

[9][10] In March 2006, Briton Karl Bushby and French-American adventurer Dimitri Kieffer crossed the strait on foot, walking across a frozen 90-kilometer (56 mi) section in 15 days.

The specially modified Land Rover Defender 110 was driven by Steve Burgess and Dan Evans across the straits on its second attempt following the interruption of the first by bad weather.

[18] A further proposal for a bridge-and-tunnel link from eastern Russia to Alaska was made by French engineer Baron Loicq de Lobel in 1906.

Despite the unprecedented engineering, political, and financial challenges, Russia green-lit a US$65-billion TKM-World Link tunnel project in August 2011.

[25] In 1956, the Soviet Union proposed to the US a joint bi-national project to warm the Arctic Ocean and melt some of the ice cap.

[26] American Charles P. Steinmetz (1865–1923) earlier proposed to widen the Bering Strait by removing St. Lawrence Island and parts of Seward and Chukotski Peninsulas.

Traditionally, the indigenous people in the area had frequently crossed the border back and forth for "routine visits, seasonal festivals and subsistence trade", but were prevented from doing so during the Cold War.