a city under republic jurisdiction in the Azerbaijan SSR. Situated on the northwestern coast of the Apsheron Peninsula, 35 km from Baku. Population, 160,000 (1975; 6,000 in 1939, 51,000 in 1959, and 124,000 in 1970). The city has a railroad station.

Sumgait grew up in 1949 on the site of a small settlement in connection with the development of the republic’s chemical and metallurgical industries. It is second after Baku in industrial significance in Azerbaijan. The main branches of industry in Sumgait are chemicals and metallurgy; the former is represented by the Sumgaitkhimprom production association and a plant producing synthetic rubber, and the latter by plants producing rolled pipe and aluminum. Enterprises of the building-materials industry include a combine producing polymeric construction materials, a housing-construction combine, and plants producing rein-forced-concrete items and window glass. The city has a compressor plant and a factory producing knit outerwear. There is also a district heat and power plant in the city. Educational institutions include a branch of the Azerbaijan Institute of Petroleum and Chemistry, a chemical engineering technicum and a polytechnic technicum, and schools of medicine and music. Among Sumgait’s cultural attractions are a museum of the city’s history and a people’s amateur theater.

The urban plan for Sumgait, which was drawn up in 1949 by the architects M. Useinov, M. Datiev, O. M. Isaev, and V. I. Khvatkova, separates the industrial area from the residential green zone. In the residential districts, the streets are arranged mostly in a grid pattern, and five-story dwellings predominate; the height of buildings increases as one moves toward the sea, reaching a maximum of nine to 12 stories. Among the city’s major buildings are the Palace of Culture (1958, architect M. G. Aliev) and the trade center (1971, architects A. A. Salamova and Iu. P. Tolstonogov). Sumgait has a monument to V. I. Lenin (1956, bronze and stone, sculptors T. Mamedov and O. El’darov and architects O. M. Isaev and Iu. P. Tolstonogov).

(also Gorduchai, Guzduchai, Dzhangichai, or Kozluchai), a river in the Azerbaijan SSR. The Sumgait is 182 km long and drains an area of about 1,800 sq km. It rises in the Greater Caucasus and empties into the Caspian Sea. It is fed by mixed sources. High water occurs in March and April, and low water in summer and autumn, at which time the lower course dries up. The mean flow rate 46 km from the mouth is about 1.1 cu m per sec. The lower Sumgait crosses the Samur-Apsheron canal. The river is used for irrigation. The city of Sumgait is located at the mouth.