The name “Road of Life”, which Leningraders gave to the ice route across Lake Ladoga, which began work on November 22, 1941, is not a poetic image. This was the only way that allowed besieged Leningrad to survive and even help the front, which received weapons produced in the besieged city.
The road began to operate in those days when food standards in the city were reduced to the tragic 250 g of bread per day for workers and 125 g for everyone else, people began to die of hunger in the thousands. Soldiers on the front line received 500 g of bread. But even to maintain these standards, at least a thousand tons of food were required daily.
The construction of an ice road through Ladoga is an absolutely grandiose and daring idea even for peacetime, especially considering that in 1941 Ladoga had not been sufficiently explored, including its ice regime
Sergey Kurnosov
Director of the State Memorial Museum of the Defense and Siege of Leningrad
To save the city and help the front, it was necessary to do the incredible: create an entire infrastructure from scratch, which had to operate uninterruptedly throughout the winter, solving many problems. Such a project seemed difficult even for peacetime. In fact, this was a victory of science, and above all physics, over Hitler’s tactics, which used hunger as a means of warfare.
“The construction of an ice road through Ladoga is an absolutely grandiose and daring idea even for peacetime, especially considering that in 1941 Ladoga had not been sufficiently explored, including its ice regime. The largest lake in Europe generally has a very changeable character and has always been considered very complex in all respects, including for shipping,” notes Sergei Kurnosov, director of the State Memorial Museum of the Defense and Siege of Leningrad.
“The road of life is usually presented to the average person as a road on ice, along which lorries with flour go to Leningrad,” says Kurnosov. “But in fact, it is a huge infrastructure created literally from scratch, which made it possible to supply both Leningrad and Kronstadt during the siege , and the Oranienbaum bridgehead, and the troops of the Leningrad Front, and the Red Banner Baltic Fleet. The Road of Life has many components: it is an “air bridge” with the mainland, and the Ladoga military flotilla, which protected Ladoga communications, and the North-Western River Shipping Company, which carried out transportation to the time of navigation, when the lake was not covered with ice; this is a telephone and telegraph cable, which provided communication with Moscow, and a high-voltage electrical cable, which made it possible to supply electricity to Leningrad from the Volkhov hydroelectric station - these cables ran along the bottom of Ladoga. This is the pipeline, which also passed along the bottom of Ladoga, supplying the city with fuel."
Leningrad, as a metropolis, has never been and could not be self-sufficient in food terms, the museum director emphasizes. It was self-sufficient only as a front city, because it could produce most of the military weapons itself.
When designing the Road of Life, the experience of the past was taken into account, when ice routes became a convenient crossing, sometimes more reliable and comfortable than the autumn-spring off-road conditions; ice routes were also used for military purposes. “Was the Road of Life an urgent invention of blockaded Leningrad? Yes and no,” says Kurnosov. “On the one hand, it was certainly an urgent invention. On the other hand, the idea of moving on ice existed for a long time. In St. Petersburg even before the revolution "moving on the ice of the Neva in winter was a common phenomenon. These roads completely replaced bridges."
But all the ice communications that preceded the Road of Life were short-term and were not designed for the huge traffic and human flow that walked on the ice of Lake Ladoga in 1941–43.
Ice reconnaissance
The idea of an ice route had been discussed in Leningrad since September 1941. “On September 24, A.A. Zhdanov, members of the Military Council of the Leningrad Front were presented with materials in the form of maps and text on 34 sheets. Then we reported on the expected nature of freezing and the duration of preservation of the ice cover. On this day, the project of the Ladoga Road of Life was actually born.” , - wrote the head of the ice service of the Red Banner Baltic Fleet, Mikhail Kazansky, in his memoirs.
He played a big role in organizing the crossing of Ladoga. “Kazansky distinguished himself both as an organizer, and as a designer, and then as a pilot - both water and ice. He accompanied ships during navigation and supervised the maintenance of the ice route. He had the nickname Ice Grandfather, and this was the “grandfather” at the time he began work The road of life was only 25 years old,” notes Sergei Kurnosov.
A preliminary ice route between Kobona and Kokkorevo was laid on the basis of materials provided by scientific research and interviews with fishermen - old-timers of Ladoga.
The first detachment of seven lorries, each of which carried seven bags of flour, moved on ice no more than 15 cm thick. The drivers stood on the steps and, in case of danger of the car falling through the ice, had to jump out. The detachment drove about 20 km, but there was no further way - the ice was ending and the ice hole was beginning. The machines had to unload the flour onto the ice and return
“We started to determine the condition of the ice along the routes of the planned routes on November 12,” recalled Mikhail Kazansky. “Every step the scouts took was a step into the unknown. Where the springy ice crust bent under the feet of the daredevils and cracked, they had to lie down and crawl.”
On the night of November 16, the hydrographers harnessed themselves to sleighs and, with compasses, maps, and lines (cables), descended onto the sagging ice in the area of the Osinovets flotilla base and first examined the route from Osinovets on the western shore of Ladoga to Kobona on the eastern shore.
Almost simultaneously with the sailors, 30 soldiers of the 88th separate bridge-building battalion carried out reconnaissance of this route. The detachment left Kokkorevo with a supply of poles, ropes and rescue equipment, accompanied by two experienced fishermen who served as guides.
The commander of one of the groups of this detachment, I. Smirnov, later recalled: “In camouflage suits, with weapons, hung with grenades, we had a warlike appearance, but pickets, sleds with poles, ropes, life preservers made us look like winterers of the Far North.” The scouts moved one at a time, three to five steps apart from each other, and every 300–400 meters they froze pegs into the ice.
On the same day, by order of the authorized Military Council of the front, General A. Shilov, vehicles with flour were sent across the lake in a western direction from a separate supply company for Leningrad. The first detachment of seven lorries (GAZ-AA), each of which was carrying seven bags of flour, moved north of the Zelentsy Islands on ice no more than 15 cm thick.
Drivers stood on the steps and, in case of danger of the car falling through the ice, had to jump out. The detachment drove about 20 km from Kobona, but there was no further way - the ice was ending and the ice hole was beginning. The machines had to return after unloading the flour onto the ice.
On November 19, a horse-drawn convoy of 350 teams set off from Kokkorevo. On November 21, he delivered 63 tons of flour to Osinovets, but his route was extremely difficult: in some places, the drivers unloaded bags of flour from the sleigh onto the ice, led the teams empty, carried the flour in their hands and loaded it back into the sleigh.
It was obvious that starting automobile traffic on thin November ice was an extremely risky undertaking, but there was no way to wait.
Order No. 00172 “On the organization of a motor-tractor road across Lake Ladoga” was signed on the evening of November 19, 1941. The development of the route and the construction of infrastructure had to go in parallel with the launch of the ice road.
What is a deflexograph
The rules for driving along the Road of Life were developed not at the State Traffic Inspectorate, but at the Leningrad Physics and Technology Institute (Physico-Technical Institute, Physicotechnical Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences). The possibilities of Ladoga ice as a road surface were studied by a group of Physics and Technology scientists led by Peter Kobeko. Physicists determined how the ice cover on the lake was deformed under the influence of static loads of different magnitudes, what fluctuations occurred in it under the influence of wind and changes in surge water levels, calculated the wear of ice on the routes and the conditions for its breaking.
To automatically record ice vibrations, Physics and Technology scientist Naum Reinov invented a special device - a deflexograph. He could record ice fluctuations over a time period from 0.1 seconds to a day. With its help, it was possible to determine the reason why, in the first weeks of the Roads of Life’s operation, about a hundred trucks went under the ice: the problem was the resonance that arose when the vehicle’s speed coincided with the speed of the Ladoga wave under the ice.
The rules for driving along the Road of Life were developed not at the State Traffic Inspectorate, but at the Leningrad Institute of Physics and Technology. To automatically record ice vibrations, Physics and Technology scientist Naum Reinov invented a special device - a deflexograph. With its help, it was possible to determine the reason why about a hundred trucks went under ice in the first weeks of operation.
The wave reflected from the shore and waves created by neighboring cars also had an influence. This happened if the lorry was moving at a speed of 35 km/h. Scientists also did not recommend driving cars in convoys and warned against overtaking on ice. When driving along parallel routes, the distance between trucks had to be at least 70–80 m. The help of science made it possible to reduce losses, and the route was operated until April 24, 1942. The last cars passed through Ladoga when the ice thickness was only 10 cm.
Leningrad meteorologists compiled a special weather forecast for Ladoga for the winter of 1941–42, constantly updated information on the lake regime, and compiled detailed maps with reviews of the ice situation and a forecast of its development for two and ten days. The carrying capacity of the ice was re-determined several times a month, and hydrological bulletins with forecasts of ice thickness were compiled every ten days: during the first winter of the blockade alone, it was measured more than 3,640 times.
From horses to buses
The cargo turnover of the route Cape Osinovets - Zelentsy Islands with a branch to Kobona and Lavrovo was determined to be 4000 tons per day. Transshipment bases for the road were established in Osinovets, Vaganovo, Kobon, Lavrovo and at the Ladozhskoye Ozero station. From November 22, pedestrian and horse-drawn traffic opened along the road, and from November 25, automobile traffic. On November 26, 1941, by order for the rear of the Leningrad Front, the ice road became known as Military Highway No. 101 (VAD-101).
“At first, sleigh convoys were launched on the ice, because it could not yet support cars,” says Sergei Kurnosov. “Ice, sufficient for the then automobile transport to move on it, had to be at least 20–30 cm thick. November 19 In 1941, a horse-drawn sleigh train set off for the eastern shore of Ladoga, returning to Osinovets on November 21 with flour for the Leningraders. In the evening of the same day, a specially formed reconnaissance column of ten empty lorries set off across the ice from Leningrad through Ladoga! On November 22, onto the ice towards Kobona 60 cars had already left, which returned, delivering 33 tons of bread to Leningrad. This is how the ice track of the Road of Life began its work. Each of the one and a half cars was loaded with only five or six bags of flour - they were afraid that the ice simply couldn’t stand it anymore, it would bend under the wheels from gravity."
German shells and bombs left holes, which in the cold were literally immediately covered with ice, the snow masked them, and sometimes it was absolutely impossible to detect them. They tried to pull out the sunken cars. The cargo was also saved: the flour was transported to Leningrad breweries, dried there and then used for baking bread.
The ice route was only 12–15 km from the German positions, so there was always the threat of an air raid or shelling. Shells and bombs left holes that, in such frost, were literally immediately covered with ice, the snow masked them, and sometimes it was absolutely impossible to detect them. They tried to pull out the sunken cars, but this was not always possible. Not only the cars were saved, but also the cargo: the flour was taken to Leningrad breweries, dried there and then used to bake bread.
The matter was complicated by the fact that the old railway between Osinovets and Leningrad was not ready to receive intense cargo flows: before the war it handled no more than one train a day, but now it handled six or seven large trains. “There weren’t even water towers on this road, and water had to be supplied to the locomotives manually; in addition, trees had to be cut right there on the spot to supply the locomotives with raw and very poor fuel,” wrote British journalist Alexander Werth, who worked in USSR during the war and visited Leningrad. - In fact, the ice route through Lake Ladoga began to work like clockwork only at the end of January or even from February 10, 1942, after its serious reorganization."
In January 1942, evacuation was actively underway along the Road of Life. Passenger buses were used to transport people - there were more than a hundred of them.
Tanks without turrets
During the two blockade winters, more than 1 million tons of cargo were transported along the ice road and about 1.5 million people were evacuated.
“According to various sources, from 16 to 18 thousand people worked on the highway,” says historian Rostislav Lyubvin. “Sometimes Leningraders stayed until they could leave, and worked there unaccounted for. The infrastructure was maintained by professional workers - loaders in warehouses, three auto repair plants: mechanics , turners, blacksmiths, and finally, among the drivers there were not only military personnel, but also drivers from civilian enterprises. The rotation was large."
“From November 1941 to April 1942 (152 days), the ice road was serviced by about 4,000 cars, not counting horse-drawn transport,” notes Sergei Kurnosov. “Every fourth car did not return from the trip, falling into the wormwood or coming under bombing or artillery fire.” The technical condition of the cars during almost the entire first period of operation of the track was extremely low. By March 1942, 1,577 damaged cars were towed from Ladoga. There was a shortage of fuel, tools, spare parts and repairs.
Ports on the coast were built at a very fast pace. “The Germans, having captured Shlisselburg, actually captured the entire port infrastructure on Southern Ladoga, because since the times of the Russian Empire, Shlisselburg was the main port in this part of the lake,” notes Sergei Kurnosov. “Fishing villages, where there was virtually no infrastructure, in a matter of weeks it was necessary to turn into two powerful ports: one on the western coast, in the area of the Osinovetsky lighthouse, the other on the east, in the area of \u200b\u200bKobona. A huge mooring front was built, new routes were laid - and all this was done literally on the “mossy, muddy" shores. Already by the end of the navigation of 1942, there were two huge lake ports, which were separated by 30–35 km. A berthing front more than 8 km long was built. Up to 80 ships could moor at these berths at the same time - and all this was created from scratch to save the city and to help the Leningrad Front survive."
In total, more than 60 trails were built on the Road of Life. Some were intended for transporting equipment; ammunition was transported along a different route, and in such a way that in the event of an explosion, neighboring vehicles would not be damaged. The wounded and children were transported separately, and vehicles with petroleum products were also transported separately, because in the event of an explosion there would be a huge flame and, as a result, melted ice
Rostislav Lyubvin
“When the work of the road somewhat improved, the purpose of the routes was strictly defined,” says Lubvin. “Some were intended for transporting equipment, ammunition went along another route, and in such a way that in the event of an explosion, neighboring cars would not be damaged. Separately, there was a removal of the wounded and children ", there were also separate vehicles with petroleum products, because in the event of an explosion there would be a huge flame and, as a result, melted ice. Everything was very thought out."
“The road of life served not only to deliver food to Leningrad,” notes Sergei Kurnosov. “The return flight from the city carried products, including military products, which Leningrad factories continued to produce during the blockade. Even KV tanks, which they were made only in Leningrad in 1941. To transport them, the turret was removed from the tank, thus reducing the area of pressure on the ice, and the tank, following its own power across the ice of Ladoga, towed its turret behind it on a sled.”
Also, mortars and artillery pieces, including those needed in the battle for Moscow, were transported from Leningrad factories across Ladoga. Equipment and valuables that had not been evacuated before the blockade were transported from Leningrad to the rear.
The approaches to the Road of Life from Kobona were defended by the 1st NKVD Rifle Division, which defended Shlisselburg until September 8, and from Osinovets by the 20th NKVD Division, which fought on the Nevsky Piglet in October 1941. “The forces of the sailors were brought here, some of the sailors-artillerymen were transferred to ground units to service the artillery and anti-aircraft batteries that were installed along the route,” says Rostislav Lyubvin. “Huge forces of sappers constantly mined the approaches from Shlisselburg.” Lenfront aviation covered the road to life. From December 1941 to March 1942, pilots flew more than 6,000 combat missions.
“The losses, especially at first, were very large,” states an employee of the Police Museum. “In 1965, a group of divers in honor of the 20th anniversary of the Victory walked along the bottom of the lake, along the Road of Life. They said that they actually walked on the roofs of cars.”
Mikhail Kazansky compared the Road of Life with a sea crossing: “Troop crossing across ice bridgeheads at night, without seeing the shores, or during the day, in fog and snowstorm, can be compared with pilotage of ships in pitch darkness, when lighthouses do not work and there are no navigation aids at all. Analogy will become more complete if we take into account that the wind carried columns on the ice, like ships, away from the laid out course. More than once we had to see how infantry battle formations drifted on slippery, as if polished ice, like a crazy wind, tearing out individual fighters, drove these "living sails" into minefields, cars spun like a top and overturned. Not every transition ended happily."
NKVD on the Road of Life: against traffic jams and crimes
A combined detachment of the Leningrad regional police department worked on VAD-101. The task forces were located on the line, at transport stops and at loading and unloading bases. At the beginning of the work of the Road of Life, traffic jams arose in its individual sections - this problem was solved by December 26.
“This was inevitable, because no one had ever built such a highway or worked on it, especially since in the first days there was only one highway, and there was traffic in both directions. Drivers went to the Ladoga highway after having already driven almost 300 km along a country road from the village of Zaborye in the Tikhvin region,” explains Rostislav Lyubvin. “When Tikhvin was recaptured, the warehouses moved mainly to the Pella area, the journey was shortened to 40 km, it became easier, and people came not so exhausted.”
Police officers provided drivers with technical assistance. “We found a lot of workers on the Road of Life,” recalls Lyubvin. “I then asked what kind of technical assistance, and one veteran told me: you take a wrench and climb under the car to turn the nuts, help the driver restore the car, and when overloaded you become even and a loader."
During the first winter of operation of the ice track, the police identified 589 aimless vehicle downtimes. “The police worked on principle and found out why the driver was standing without any reason where he was not supposed to stand, and everything could have ended in court,” says a specialist from the Police Museum. Fighting thefts on the Road of Life, by the end of March 1942, the police had seized 33.4 tons of food from criminals, including 23 tons of flour. 586 military personnel and 232 civilians were brought to criminal liability. There were also cases when drivers were prosecuted for taking money and valuables from people evacuated from Leningrad.
The Road of Life continued to operate in the winter of 1942–43, when it was used not only to supply the city, but also in preparation for the Red Army's offensive to break the blockade. “This is the infrastructure that was the only military-strategic line of communication of besieged Leningrad until the so-called Victory Road was laid in late January - early February 1943 along a narrow section along the southern shore of Ladoga after the breaking of the siege of Leningrad,” emphasizes Sergei Kurnosov. “In principle, The Road of Life operated one way or another until 1944, helping to supply the city."
Yulia Andreeva, Ekaterina Andreeva, Ivan Skirtach
“There was nothing unusual in the very fact of moving troops and cargo across ice,” says military historian Miroslav MOROZOV. - During the Finnish campaign, the 168th Infantry Division, surrounded in the Pitkäranta area, was supplied along the ice road through the same Lake Ladoga. Already in World War II, in order to recapture the island of Gotland in the Baltic from the enemy, even tanks were brought onto the ice. But never - neither before nor after this - the life of a city of three million depended on the thickness of the ice and weather conditions on the 40-kilometer route across Lake Ladoga.
There was extremely little food in Leningrad after the Badayevsky warehouses burned down in September 1941. Even according to the “hunger norm” in mid-December 1941, the city consumed about 500 tons of flour daily. During September - November, the norms for the distribution of bread to the population were reduced 5 times. After the fourth decline, starvation began in the city.
Until Ladoga completely froze (and in 1941 this happened on November 25), food was delivered to Leningrad by ship. It seems incredible, but 5 days before, communication across the ice opened. For five days, the ships, which walked along fairways cut into the ice, and horse-drawn carts with sleighs (the cars went to Leningrad later) walked in parallel!
On April 24, 1942, the ice road ceased operation until the following year. During this time, 361 thousand tons of cargo were transported to Leningrad (before the end of the war - more than 1.5 million tons - Ed.) and half a million people were evacuated. For comparison: the air bridge, which was the only alternative way to supply the besieged city, transported 3.6 thousand tons - 100 times less. Without the Road of Life, Leningrad would really have perished.”
Through impossible
Leningrad hydrologists, whom they initially tried to involve in laying a route through Ladoga, unanimously said that this was impossible. No one had ever studied the lake in winter - there was no point. Old-timers could remember only one case when a drunk driver carried hay across the lake and disappeared. It was in January, during the Epiphany frosts. We were talking about automobile traffic, and in November, when, according to the recollections of veterans, the ice sagged even under their feet. But the war forced us to reconsider all safety standards. “Driver, remember! A bag of rye flour is a ration for a thousand residents of Leningrad!” - said the poster installed at that time on Vaganovsky Spusk (the eastern shore of Ladoga), where the Road of Life began.
During the first winter of the siege, military driver Vasily Serdyuk got caught in a snowstorm on the highway and got stuck. After the war, he wrote in his memoirs that he almost fell asleep while waiting for his “one and a half” (GAZ-AA) to be rescued from a snowdrift. I was awakened by a blow to the side - in the dark an old man with a sled team ran into the truck.
“When the old man saw me, he suddenly fell silent.
- Not alive! - he said with surprise. - Alone in the cabin?
- One!
- You're lucky, guy!
And he nodded over the horse's croup towards the sleigh. There, under the matting, lay several frozen bodies.”
These were ordinary everyday life of the Road of Life, on which in 1941-1943. over 20 thousand worked Human. How many of them died is still unknown.
“The chief of logistics of the Leningrad Front, Lieutenant General Lagunov, was responsible for organizing the transportation of goods along the Road of Life,” continues Miroslav Morozov. - Direct management of automobile traffic was carried out by his deputy, Major General Shilov. By January 1942, the route had acquired a rather complex infrastructure. Along the ice roads there were technical assistance points (“one and a half trucks” often stalled), heating and food points, traffic controller posts... The sky was guarded by anti-aircraft batteries (guns) and anti-aircraft machine-gun companies and platoons armed with “maxims”. On the military map of 1941-1942. “More than 20 air defense facilities can be counted.”
Iron attempt
The road of life through Ladoga was the most famous, but not the only one in those places. On the southern coast of the Gulf of Finland, until January 1944, the Oranienbaum bridgehead successfully fought off the Germans. He was connected with the mainland by the “Little Road of Life”, which ran on ice through Kronstadt. During the war, 470 thousand people walked along it in both directions. And in Ladoga during different years of the war they tried to launch either a trolleybus route or a railway...
The first project was rejected immediately. They tried to implement the second one. In the winter of 1942-1943. At the same time, construction of a 35-kilometer “pile-ice railway crossing” from Kobona station on the eastern side of Ladoga to the Ladoga Lake station on the western side began on both banks. Builders (mostly women!) made holes in the ice and drove piles into the bottom. A flooring was laid on top, on which the railway track was mounted. By mid-January 1943, slightly less than half of the road had been built. The first trains were already running on the rails, but on January 18, 1943, the blockade was lifted. All unimaginable efforts turned out to be meaningless. This is probably why they preferred to forget about the “Railroad of Life”.
SEE PHOTO GALLERY “Siege of Leningrad”
November 18th 1941
The beginning of laying the “Road of Life”. During the Great Patriotic War, the 88th separate bridge-building battalion began ice reconnaissance of Lake Ladoga with the aim of creating an ice road to besieged Leningrad. Work to create the route, which led about 20 thousand people, began in October. On November 19, an order was signed for the troops of the Leningrad Front “On the organization of a road and tractor road across Lake Ladoga.”
On November 22, the first convoy of GAZ-AA trucks entered the ice. The ice road, which became known as Military Automobile Road No. 101 (VAD-101), began operating on November 26, 1941. The entire road had to be moved to a new track due to ice fatigue. And during the first month of operation, the road was transferred to new routes four times, and some sections of it even more often. Trucks regularly delivered food
The route was laid out and marked with milestones. The Ice Road was a well-organized highway that provided drivers with confident driving at high speed. The track was served by 350 traffic controllers, whose tasks included dispersing cars, indicating the direction of movement, monitoring the safety of ice and other duties. The road has become a complex engineering structure. Its builders made road signs, milestones, portable shields, bridges, built bases, warehouses, heating and medical stations, food and technical assistance stations, workshops, telephone and telegraph stations, and adapted various means of camouflage. This work required dedication and courage, as it had to be carried out under any conditions - severe frosts, freezing winds, blizzards, shelling and enemy air raids. In addition, lighthouse lanterns with blue glass were installed - first at every 450-500 m, and then at 150-200 m
On November 24, 1941, the Military Council of the Leningrad Front adopted resolution No. 00419 “On the construction of Military Highway No. 102 (VAD-102).” Thus, now the delivery of goods to Leningrad began to be carried out along two roads.
The road consisted of two ring routes, each of which had two separate directions of movement - for freight traffic (to the city) and for empty traffic or evacuation (from the city). The first route for transporting goods to the city ran along the route Zhikharevo - Zhelannye - Troitskoye - Lavrovo - station. Lake Ladoga, the length of the route was 44 km; for empty vehicles and evacuation from the city - Art. Lake Ladoga or Borisova Griva - Vaganovsky Descent - Lavrovo - Gorodishche - Zhikharevo with a length of 43 km. The total length of the flight along the first ring road was 83 km.
The second route for cargo transportation ran along the route Voybokalo - Kobona - Vaganovsky Spusk - station. Lake Ladoga or Borisova Griva (58 km) and for empty or evacuation - station. Lake Ladoga or Borisova Griva - Vaganovsky descent - Lavrovo - Babanovo - Voybokalo (53 km). The total length of the second ring route was 111 km. The former Tikhvin - Novaya Ladoga highway ceased to function, but was maintained in working condition.
Despite frosts and snowstorms, enemy artillery fire and air strikes, and the enemy’s occupation of Tikhvin on November 8, the movement of freight vehicles did not stop for almost a single day. In November-December, 16,449 tons of cargo were delivered along the route.
The “Road of Life” is not only a route on the ice of the lake, it is a path that had to be overcome from the railway station on the western shore of the lake to the railway station on the eastern shore and back. The road worked until the last possible opportunity. In mid-April, the air temperature began to rise to 12 - 15°C and the ice cover of the lake began to quickly collapse. A large amount of water accumulated on the surface of the ice. For a whole week - from April 15 to 21 - the vehicles walked through solid water, in some places up to 45 cm deep. On the last trips, the vehicles did not reach the shore and carried the loads by hand. Further movement on the ice became dangerous, and on April 21 the Ladoga Ice Route was officially closed, but in fact it functioned until April 24, as some drivers, despite the order to close the route, continued to travel on Ladoga. When the lake began to open up and traffic on the highway stopped, highway workers moved 65 tons of food products from the eastern to the western shore. In total, during the winter of 1941/42, 361,109 tons of various cargoes were delivered to Leningrad along the ice route, including 262,419 tons of food.
This was forty years ago. Having failed to capture Leningrad by storm without overcoming its defenses, the enemy hoped for the city's quick death from starvation as a result of a complete blockade. Obviously, the German command did not even think about the possibility of organizing any serious communication across Lake Ladoga. But the concept of the impossible became very relative when it came to saving Leningrad. For 152 days, from November 22, 1941 to April 24, 1942, and 98 days, from December 23, 1942 to March 30, 1943, there was a Road of Life - an ice route laid along Lake Ladoga, along which the city received the most necessary things in order to live and fight. Chauffeur Ivan Vasilievich Maksimov from the first to the last day he drove cars with cargo for Leningrad and took people out. He tells how it happened. Photographs of the war years, collected by participants in the Ladoga epic, explain his story.
They don't know on earth yet
Scarier and more joyful than the road.
“On the night of November 22, the first column of ten vehicles descended from the western shore onto the ice. I was in this column. It was a dark and windy night over the lake. There was no snow yet, and the black stripes of the ice field often seemed like open water. I won’t hide it, fear froze our hearts, our hands were shaking: probably both from tension and from weakness - for four days, like all Leningraders, we received biscuit a day... But our convoy had just been in Leningrad. And I saw how people died from hunger... Salvation was on the eastern shore. We understood that we had to get there at any cost. Not all the cars reached the shore, but the first group move was completed. I even remembered the first hot soup that we received. The next day these cars were heading back , bringing bread to Leningraders. While the ice was thin, it was impossible to fully load the car. We adapted to the situation - we used sleigh trailers to reduce the load on the ice.
The first flights are etched in my memory as the most difficult. We drove slowly, tensely, as if testing the way... After a few days, we took a closer look, felt the road, and gained confidence.
The harsh winter of 1941 seemed to be rushing to our rescue. Every day the ice became thicker and stronger. Traffic intensity and vehicle loading increased. For the first month I did not leave my car. It was also my home... Having crossed the lake, I quickly handed over the cargo, drove to the side, covered the “front” with the cabin with a tarpaulin in order to retain the heat from the hot engine longer, and fell asleep. After two or three hours I woke up from the cold, started the engine, took the cargo and went on the flight again.
People from Leningrad were transported from the western to the eastern shore. These flights were the most stressful and painful for me. Exhausted from hunger, people lay and sat motionless, seemingly indifferent. There were cases when paramedics, removing people from a car, reported that someone had died on the road. From pity, anger and grief, my heart sank, a lump came to my throat... I was always in a hurry when I was traveling with people, it seemed like I wouldn’t be able to do everything in time and I was terribly afraid of delays on the road.
At the end of December the number of flights increased. When counting, I was among the leading ones. Once on the eastern bank, in Kobon, where food warehouses were located, before the vehicle was unloaded, I was called to the commander and presented with a gift from the Leningraders. These were warm things. Squeezing the gift in my hands, I listened to the words of gratitude, but in response I could not say a single word... I did not cry, only tears flowed and flowed down my cheeks.
I was given a day of rest. They sent me to the sanitary station - within a month I was so overgrown that I couldn’t even see my eyes, a long beard had grown, my clothes had become salty and stiff. This was the first break since the start of work on the ice track.
The road was quickly developed. Mass transportation began. Trucks on the highway traveled in blizzards and blizzards, day and night, often falling into ice holes pierced by bombs and shells, dying before reaching the shore, or drowning. But despite incredible difficulties, food delivery did not stop. Soon we even abandoned camouflage, and at night, with headlights on, cars walked in a continuous stream.
The road was under fire all the time. However, most of the bombs and shells fell nearby. The drivers maneuvered and changed speed. The road workers immediately found new, workarounds or “patched” the road - they laid wooden walkways and froze the decking. The route was destroyed, but the road continued to live.
Driving on ice itself was difficult and dangerous. Under the influence of strong winds and changes in the water level in the lake, frequent movements of the ice fields occurred, and ice mountains, sometimes five to ten meters high, appeared along the way. Cracks and fissures appeared. It was necessary to build a lot of switchboards and walkways. During the winter of 1941 - 1942, the bridge-building battalion installed 147 prefabricated bridges on the ice of the lake, capable of withstanding the weight of not only loaded vehicles, but even tanks.
Gradually, the road, one might say, became settled. Along the route, tents and snow houses appeared for road workers and repairmen who lived here to come to the aid of the drivers at any moment. In such houses, “potbelly stoves” were installed, and telephone cables were pulled to them.
At the seventh kilometer of the route there was a tent for a sanitary and medical station. Olya Pisarenko, a military paramedic, lived there throughout the harsh winter. She surprised even the Ice Road veterans with her courage and endurance. She worked without rest or sleep, often under severe fire providing medical assistance to the wounded and frostbitten.
One day, her section of the road was bombed by sixteen fascist planes. Bombs riddled the highway. Olya fell into a hole. With difficulty they helped her get out, but she did not leave the track, she was barely alive and frostbitten, she continued to help the wounded.
A front actually passed along the highway. And every flight completed was like a battle won. The track was extremely busy. Here are entries from the diary of the headquarters of the 64th regiment, whose personnel were always on the ice and servicing the road.
“On November 23, 1941, several horses and cars fell through the ice.
5th of December. Fascist air raid on the fourteenth kilometer... A car with gasoline was set on fire. Between the tenth and fifteenth kilometers, thirty shells exploded, and about one hundred and forty bombs were dropped along the entire route. Between the twentieth and twenty-fifth kilometers a longitudinal crack formed."
Despite everything, traffic along the highway did not stop. Immediately after the raids, road workers went out onto the ice, laying new roads. Immediately the traffic controllers ran to the cars, showing the drivers a new path. And the traffic controllers were Leningrad Komsomol girls. They stood in the icy wind or snow at a distance of 350-400 meters from each other during the day with flags, and at night with lit bat lanterns. They kept their heroic watch around the clock in any weather.
In January, heavy anti-aircraft artillery could be installed on the strengthened ice. When it appeared, it was almost impossible for the enemy to precisely bomb the road.
The route was covered by troops of the Ladoga air defense region, anti-aircraft artillery and fighter aviation regiments of the front and navy, soldiers of rifle units and marines, border troops and an NKVD division. All approaches to the Ice Road were mined. As a result of all these measures, the flow of goods to Leningrad increased every day.
A team was even organized to lift cars and tanks from the bottom of the lake. After repairs, they returned to service again.
Road participants rejoiced at every increase in rations for Leningraders. On December 25 there was the first increase in the bread quota. The minimum was 250 grams per day for workers, 125 grams for everyone else. But already in April, Leningraders were given an average of half a kilogram of bread and the norms for other products were increased. The city lived and continued to fight.
In April, the snow began to melt, the water rose, and it filled the ruts of the road. That's when our torment began. You start slipping or braking a little, and the ice beneath you goes into the water. On April 24, the route was closed.
The legendary Road of Life existed for 152 days.
Tributes to our memory of war heroes sometimes bypass the names of those who ensured victory in the rear. But in vain.
interesting additions to the discussion a year ago -
The only way, other than ineffective aviation, for evacuating people from besieged Leningrad, as well as for delivering provisions and military cargo back to the city in September-November 1941, was Lake Ladoga, along which ships of the Ladoga Flotilla sailed daily. However, it was obvious that the German ring around the city would not be broken before the onset of cold weather, and in order to avoid the possibility of a complete blockade of Leningrad in winter, it was necessary to find a way out as soon as possible. And such a solution was found - this is the idea of creating ice crossings across Lake Ladoga, which later received the name “Road of Life”.
At first, many were quite skeptical about this idea, since they doubted that the ice would be able to carry the huge amount of cargo that was going to be transported through it. The Germans did not believe in this either; in the leaflets scattered over Leningrad they literally wrote the following: “it is impossible to supply the million-strong population and the army across the ice of Lake Ladoga.” However, leaving a city of three million without supplies for the whole winter actually meant dooming its inhabitants to certain death, and work on creating an ice crossing began. First, as a result of the titanic work of the Logistics Directorate on the Leningrad Front, all the information available at that time about the transportation of heavy cargo on ice, as well as about the ice regime specifically on Lake Ladoga, was collected in less than a month. As a result of these studies, the most suitable route for the crossing was Novaya Ladoga - Chernoushevo - Lemassar - Kobona. On November 20, 1941, the first horse-drawn carts went along the “Road of Life,” and a day later the famous GAZ-AA (one and a half trucks).
Despite the fact that it seemed that a huge amount of theoretical preparation had been carried out before the creation of the ice crossing, and besides, the winter of 1941-1942 was very harsh and snowy, Lake Ladoga presented an unpleasant surprise. It often happened that a convoy of trucks loaded to capacity covered the route without any problems, and the light vehicle following them fell through the ice. Moreover, it failed instantly, leaving no chance for the people inside. This was due to the phenomenon of resonance, little studied at that time, or rather a flexural-gravitational wave, in order to avoid which, all cars were ordered to travel at a strictly defined speed. After several such cases, the crossing received its second, more terrible name - “Death Road”.
The Germans also did not forget about the “Road of Life”, regularly carrying out air raids and artillery strikes on the lake, since their positions were literally a few kilometers from the crossing. Therefore, many lorry drivers, when driving at night, drove without turning on their headlights, in order to somehow protect themselves from air strikes; one might say that they were driving almost blindly. The drivers who worked on the “Road of Life” deserve a special mention. They spent 12 hours behind the wheel in terrible cold (most even drove with the doors open so they could jump out in case of falling through the ice), making 5-7 flights a day across the entire Lake Ladoga, but at the same time they received the same meager rations, like ordinary blockade survivors. However, none of them complained, since everyone understood how important their work was for the siege survivors and the soldiers who defended Leningrad.
The ice crossing in the winter of 1942-1943 posed an even greater danger than the year before. As a result of a mild winter with frequent thaws, the ice often broke, and this led to an even greater number of failures, but the “Road of Life”, even in such conditions, continued to operate until April 24, 1943, that is, even after the siege of Leningrad was lifted. In just two years, according to official statistics, more than 640 thousand people were evacuated across the ice of Lake Ladoga, 575 thousand tons of various cargo were delivered to the city, and about 300 thousand soldiers and officers were transported to the Leningrad Front. That is, it is obvious that the creation of the “Road of Life” in November 1941 was one of the key factors, which, at least minimally, made it possible to provide food for the residents of the city and the soldiers of the defense of Leningrad, and this in turn directly influenced the overall outcome of the Battle of Leningrad.
It would seem that everything is known about the Road of Life. However, the vast majority associate it only with the ice track along which semi-trucks travel. However, a pipeline was laid along the bottom of Lake Ladoga to supply the city with fuel and an electric cable, through which electricity was supplied to the city for machine tools of factories and Leningrad trams.
Four articles from their "Techniques of Youth" for 1946. Memories of the Blockade are still very fresh, and therefore all descriptions are devoid of additional ideological processing, especially since they were written by direct participants in the construction and operation of the arteries connecting Leningrad with the mainland.
Thanks for the scans of "Techniques of Youth" history http://gistory.livejournal.com/98042.html
This year we celebrate the first anniversary of the victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War. Now, when the broadest prospects for prosperity are opening up before us, embodied in the Law on the Five-Year Plan for the Restoration and Development of the National Economy of our Motherland,” I would like to look back at the examples of labor heroism of ordinary Soviet people during the war, and from them draw strength for further hard work on field of peaceful construction.
Winter 1942/43. The black ring of the blockade closed around the city of Lenin. Hunger, artillery shelling, and bombing hit the besieged city. The water froze, power plants and factories stopped. It seemed as if the very heart of the city had frozen. But its defenders knew: the “Main Land” will not leave them... will come... will help... And the “Main Land” extended powerful helping hands to the Leningraders through the iron ring of the blockade, over the cold surface of the Ladoga ice.
On snow-covered ice, several kilometers from the front line, thousands of trucks with food rushed into the city. Motorists brought life to an exhausted city along the icy road of life. The ice has melted. Pipes were laid along the bottom of the lake. The gas pipeline, like an underwater artery, fed the city with gasoline - the life-giving blood of cars. Power cables lay next to the gas pipeline. Electricity from the Volkhov hydroelectric station flowed into the wires of Leningrad. The city came to life. Using directional radio communication on ultrashort wolves, he communicated with the “Mainland”.
The technical feats of the Soviet people, the help to besieged Leningrad across Lake Ladoga are described in the articles “The Road of Life” by the head of the ice route, Lieutenant General A. M. Shilov, “The Underwater Artery” by the chief engineer of the construction of the gas pipeline A. Shalkevich and the articles “Energy Breakthrough of the Blockade”, "Directed Communication".
"The road of life"
Lieutenant General A. M. SHILOV
It was the Leningrad spring of 1942. The swollen Neva carried its waters to the bay. Warmed by the spring sun, people went out onto the granite embankments and watched the ice drift. The water was driving huge ice floes. Touched by the early sun, They have already begun to thaw and darkened on top.
Wide grooves were visible across one of the floating blocks, as if thousands of machines had rolled the once smooth surface of the ice.
“Look, this is a piece of the “Road of Life” floating,” people on the embankment said.
Who knows how many human lives were saved by this extraordinary road - a bridge between the besieged city and the “Mainland”, built by nature itself and the will of man. Warmed by the “spring sun, they float - the transparent ice spans of a giant bridge across the lake, which was not listed” on any map and melted away like an unforgettable fairy tale about human courage.
The Germans sent over 40 selected divisions to Leningrad in the fall of 1941. They were confident of an early victory. In a hurry, Goebbels' office fabricated a fake film - a parade of German troops at the Winter Palace, but they failed to take the city by storm. Hitler decided to suppress the city with hunger and cold. The motorized corps of General Schmidt rushed to Tikhvin with the goal of cutting off Leningrad from the “Mainland”. Now we will calmly wait until the city, like an overripe apple, falls into our hands, the Germans boasted.
But the city did not fall!
History knows many examples of besieged cities with a worldwide reputation: Troy, Carthage, Madrid, Warsaw, Paris, but the glory that fell to the city of Lenin overshadows everything else.
The city did not surrender, although it seemed to the Germans that all the conditions for this were present. Every autumn morning, a hundred Douglas aircraft landed at city airfields.” Food was unloaded from the planes. On the return flight, people got into cars to evacuate to the rear. At the same time, the city began to be supplied by ships, barges, and schooners across Lake Ladoga. The Germans were still clinging to its southern bank. In November frosts set in, and the ships, breaking through the ice, became firmly frozen at the western piers of Ladoga. Supplies stopped: the situation of the besieged became extremely difficult. It was necessary to take emergency measures. And they were accepted.
The Military Council of the Leningrad Front, on the initiative of Comrade Zhdanov, proposed to begin construction of an ice road through Ladoga - a road that later became known as the “Road of Life.”
The use of ice for transporting troops goes back to deep historical times of Russia. In February 1710, under Peter I, Apraksin's corps of 12 thousand soldiers successfully walked across the ice through the Gulf of Finland from Kotlin Island to Vyborg.
In subsequent times, Russian troops repeatedly crossed to the Swedish coast through the Åland Islands.
During the Russian-Swedish War of 1809, the famous Barclay de Tolly led a column of 5 thousand people across the ice of the Gulf of Bothnia through the Kvarken Strait - an ice route over 100 kilometers long.
During the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, an ice crossing for trains was built across Lake Baikal. The trains moved on rails laid on frozen ice.
During the Civil War, there was an ice crossing across the Volga near Syzran, across the Kama near Taishet, and across the Irtysh near Omsk. The historically memorable suppression of the Kronstadt rebellion was also carried out on the ice of the Gulf of Finland.
Finally, in 1940, during the fight against the White Finns, the famous ice campaign of the 70th Order of Lenin Rifle Division across the Vyborg Bay was carried out. Artillery, tanks, and vehicles passed across the ice.
The Ladoga ice route cannot be compared with all these operations. And in terms of the scale of its transportation, and in terms of the duration of work, and in terms of natural and combat conditions, it was an exceptional structure.
Once upon a time, the ancient water route from the Varangians to the Greeks lay here. Ladoga was famous for its treacherous character, blizzards and storms. Its surface almost never completely froze, and besides all this, the ice road was covered by enemy artillery fire and bombed by enemy aircraft.
In the name of the life of an entire city with a population of millions, the Red Army had to overcome all difficulties.
People understood this. Comrade Zhdanov’s appeal to the workers of the military road said: “Dear comrades!.. On behalf of Leningrad and the front, I ask you to take into account that you have been assigned to a great and responsible task and are performing a task of paramount state and military importance.. Your work will not be forgotten by the Motherland and Leningrad never"
It turned out that, despite the abundance of literature on Lake Ladoga, ice conditions turned out to be almost unexamined and little studied.
But there was no time to wait - the route had to be laid.
As soon as the surface of the water became covered with a thin layer of ice, uneven from hummocking, we began an urgent study of the future route of the ice road.
First, an aerial photograph of the proposed direction of the highway was taken. Then reconnaissance groups went out on a raid from the eastern and western shores of the lake.
On the night of November 16, a group of young hydrographers - Baltic sailors - walked out on the ice, slightly covered with snow pollen, from the direction of Kobona. Overcoming ice hummocks, in some places on thin, cracked ice, they walked west, cutting holes every 10 minutes to measure the thickness of the ice. Having covered about 60 kilometers in two days, the scouts collected all the necessary information to draw up a detailed map.
Almost at the same time, a horseman crossed from the western shore to the eastern shore across the ice of the lake.
The first sleigh convoys passed through the still fragile ice of the lake to Leningrad. bread.
The ice track began to exist. On November 22, a convoy of one and a half ton vehicles set off from Leningrad to pick up cargo; 60 vehicles safely crossed the ice. The cars looked unusual heading back. Behind each truck, in the back of which there were only 5-6 bags of cargo, were towed a sleigh with the same luggage. This was done in order to distribute the load over the largest possible surface of the still thin and fragile ice.
The first timid steps paid off. On the night of November 28, 100 loaded cars left the eastern bank for Leningrad. They walked in a snowstorm and blizzard, but after a few hours they reached the opposite shore.
The ice track has become operational.
From the end of November to December 15, 1941, the construction of 27 kilometers of ice route and 34 kilometers of auxiliary branches lasted.
By January 6, the ice thickness reached one meter - not only heavy vehicles, but even heavy KV tanks could move along the road.
Thousands of cars worked around the clock on the icy highway. Neither air bombing, nor machine-gun fire from aircraft, nor artillery fire from the German-occupied shore could stop the continuous flow of vehicles bringing food to the besieged city and taking women and children away from the front line.
A thin thread of road connected the huge city with the entire country, which extended helping hands to it. This thread was stronger than steel.
On December 26, 1941, Leningrad residents began to receive increased bread rations.
For anyone who is not familiar with the organization of the military highway, it is difficult to even imagine the complexity of the work of this organism, full of equipment and people.
Imagine a road on which up to 4,500 vehicles must pass per day, moving at a speed of 35-40 kilometers per hour.
The vehicles need to be loaded, unloaded, filled with flammable water, and possibly repaired along the way. All this on the windy Ladoga ice. When the transparent surface of the road is suddenly cut by a crack, water appears from it. All this in snowy drifts, not covered by anything, and almost under the very nose of the enemy.
Which driver doesn’t remember the ninth kilometer of the road, where bridges had to be built at the crossroads under artillery fire from the shore?
But the ice road was created, mastered and turned into an ice highway, equipped with the latest automotive technology.
The road was designed for separate traffic - loaded cars walked along one line, and empty cars along the other, at a distance of 100-150 meters.
Road signs and inscriptions were installed along the entire route; every kilometer there are control posts; After 5 kilometers there are water intake points.
Along the route, here on the ice, technical assistance points for repair and maintenance of vehicles, heating and medical assistance points were organized.
At night, marine shkhetilen flashing lights every 100-200 meters indicated to the vehicles the direction of their movement.
Dozens of graders, anglers, and snowplows protected the route from snow drifts. Suffice it to say that 90 percent of all snow removal work. was mechanized, 30 crawler tractors worked for cleaning. Special bridges were immediately erected by road workers in places where cracks formed, over the craters of artillery shells and high-explosive bombs.
Services: regulation, road commandant, communications, sanitary, anti-aircraft defense and, finally, EPRON (for underwater work) - all of them were used to maintain the constant survivability of the route, to fight the enemy and nature.
And “The Road of Life” did not stop for a minute. Motorists knew: the cargo of each vehicle delivered to Leningrad would save the lives of thousands of people.
Thousands of sacks of flour and boxes of food were awaiting loading on the eastern shore of Ladoga.
The drivers showed miracles of dedication. There have been cases when drivers, without leaving the car for 48 hours, traveled over a thousand kilometers. Among them was the Siberian driver Efim Vasilyev.
They made four flights per shift, tying a bowler hat with a nut in it over their heads so that its noise would prevent them from falling asleep on the way.
Wounded as a result of enemy shelling, the drivers did not abandon the vehicles with the priceless cargo, like the driver Yerkman, who, bleeding and losing consciousness, saved the vehicle and the cargo.
Hundreds of cars were brought back to life by the repairmen of ice technical assistance points. They were placed on the ice in tents and ice houses. The name of the best repair foreman Yakov Moroz will long remain in the memory of the drivers who suffered an accident on the Ladoga ice.
Anti-aircraft gunners and fighter aircraft covered the road from enemy aircraft.
The ice route rested on the courage of the Soviet people, on their unflagging will to win.
Since November 23, 1941; Until April 21, 1942, the “Road of Life” existed. For over four months it hummed with continuous traffic.
Food, fodder, ammunition, fuel, coal, parcels with gifts, mail crossed the lake on a thirty-kilometer ice bridge.
But then April came. Water appeared on the icy surface of the road. At first there was not much of it, and cars rushed through the spring puddles, scattering light splashes. The water level continued to rise; in some places, it reached 40-60 centimeters. The cars were now driving through the water like sea boats, cutting the water with their radiators. Sometimes water would already flood the engine—it would cough and stop.
It became impossible to drive.
The road is closed...
It was possible to sum up its existence.
Yes, it really was the “Road of Life”!
During its existence, over 354 thousand tons of various cargo were delivered to Leningrad. Of these, food alone amounts to 268 thousand tons.
During the same time, over 500 thousand people were evacuated from the city along the ice road.
To do this, vehicles had to travel over 41 million ton-kilometers. It is difficult to even imagine the majesty of this figure.
That is why Leningraders, looking at the spring ice floating along the Neva, filled their hearts with gratitude to the ordinary people who saved their lives by working on the cold ice of Ladoga.
During the Russian-Japanese War, an ice crossing for trains was established across Lake Baikal.
"Underwater artery"
Eng. A. FALKEVICH
Fuel is the lifeblood of machines, it is the lifeblood of military equipment and industry.
In the spring of 1942, when the ice began to smolder and it was no longer possible to deliver fuel to Leningrad along the ice route, there was a danger that the tanks, cars and other equipment in service with the troops of the Leningrad Front would be forced to stop.
The threat of shutdown also loomed over many Leningrad enterprises working for defense.
In this situation, in April 1942, the State Defense Committee decided to build an underwater pipeline along the bottom of Lake Ladoga. Gasoline from the eastern shore was supposed to flow into the besieged city through an underwater artery, unnoticed by the enemy.
The implementation of this bold decision was associated with enormous difficulties. Underwater pipelines of such length have never been built in the Union. Construction was supposed to take place only 5-6 kilometers from the front line, north of Shlisselburg. All materials and necessary equipment had to be found locally, in Leningrad. Finally, only 50 days were allotted for the construction of the gas pipeline.
The following scheme for the construction of a gasoline pipeline was developed: gasoline is transported by rail to a fuel warehouse located on the eastern shore of the lake and is pumped from railway tanks into tanks buried in the ground. From these tanks it enters a pumping station on which two high-pressure pumps are installed. Under a pressure of 12-15 atmospheres, gasoline is sent to a pipeline laid along the bottom of the lake. Coming out to the western shore of the lake, gasoline flows through an 8-kilometer-long pipeline laid in the ground to the nearest railway station. Not far from the station there is a fuel receiving warehouse, consisting of small vertical tanks and a loading rack to simultaneously refuel 10 railway tanks or 20 vehicles. The underwater pipeline consisted of seamless steel pipes 5-7 meters long, designed to pump liquid under high pressure. The wall thickness of the pipes was 7-8 millimeters, their internal diameter was 101 millimeters (4 inches). The pipeline's design capacity was 350 tons of gasoline per day.
The construction of the land part of the gas pipeline on both banks was a relatively simple task: a trench 1.2 meters deep was dug along the route line, the pipes were transported by vehicles or pulled by tractors along the route, after which they were laid in a thread and welded into sections 40-50 meters long. Welding on the route was carried out using mobile welding units consisting of an internal combustion engine and a welding generator. The so-called “rotary” method was used, in which during welding one or two assistants rotate the section. This method allows the welder to carry out the welding process in the most convenient position for him. At the end of welding, the sections were tied together by a tractor into a thread and welded together. Here, non-rotational welding was used, since it was no longer possible to rotate the sections being connected. After welding was completed, the pipeline was covered with a layer of bitumen insulation to protect against corrosion.
After laying it in the trench, it was tested with water at double the operating pressure of 25 atmospheres.
The construction of the underwater part of the gas pipeline was more difficult.
Due to the fact that the pipes for construction came from Leningrad, all preparations for the construction of the underwater part of the gas pipeline were carried out on the western shore of the lake.
For this purpose, a flat sandy area was chosen. The pipes, delivered to the middle of the site, were laid out, assembled and welded into sections 200 meters long. The sections were placed one by one on a test rack made of wooden cages, which had a slope towards the water. On this rack, each section was tested for density under triple the operating pressure of 35 atmospheres. The density of the welds was tested with kerosene, which easily penetrates into the smallest pores of the metal. After testing, the sections were covered with bitumen insulation and laid on a 300-meter long descent path.
The track consisted of rotating rollers installed at a distance of 15 meters from each other. Three quarters of the launch path are on the shore, one quarter is in the water. Each meter of thick-walled pipe weighed 18 kilograms. When lowered into water, even with plugged ends, the pipes sank.
It was impossible to drag the pipes to the bottom; this would require a huge traction force, which the welds could not withstand. Therefore, it was decided to deliver the pipes to the laying site afloat, and to impart buoyancy, tie logs to them. A section of pipes along the launch path was pulled by a tractor 30-40 meters into the water; its head part was fixed to the pontoon. The logs were tied to the pipes with hemp rope. Further retraction of the pipeline sections into the water was carried out by a towing steamer and winches installed on special flat-bottomed barges - pontoon boats. The coastal shoals did not allow the steamer to come close to the shore, so the sections were moved to the required depth from barges, and only then the towing end of the section was placed on the steamer for further pulling it into the water.
After the two-hundred-meter section was completely pulled out from the launch track, the next section was welded to it on the shore. The junction of the two sections required increased strength. Therefore, the pipes were first welded by gas welding, then a coupling was pushed onto the joint, which was pushed down with hammer blows and welded to the pipe by electric arc welding. When the length of the resulting pipeline string reached 1-2 thousand meters, the end part of the last section was also fixed to the pontoon. The afloat string of pipeline was pulled along the route by a towing steamer. Here the head pontoon was anchored, and the end pontoon was brought closer to the previously brought lash. After this, using a winch, the ends of the joined pipes were aligned. The previously welded plugs were cut off, the pipes were clamped into a special conductor and welded on the pontoon using equipment installed on a special boat. After the seam cooled, the pipes were removed from the pontoons and immersed in water. Workers, moving in small boats along the route, cut off the ropes, and the pipeline smoothly lowered to the ground.
By building up one string after another, the entire underwater part of the gas pipeline was laid. 21,500 meters of the underwater part of the gas pipeline were laid in 15 days.
Upon completion of the installation, divers inspected the entire lake part of the gas pipeline and, using weights, secured the pipes every 50-100 meters to the ground. The coastal sections of the pipeline, in order to avoid damage by ice, were washed into the ground to a depth of half a meter using a hydraulic monitor.
An inspection carried out by divers showed that the entire length of the pipeline was laid on the ground without sagging, with smooth bends where the route turned.
The gasoline pipeline was tested by pumping water and kerosene. The water was pumped under a pressure of 16-18 atmospheres, and within 24 hours no defects were revealed. Then pumping of kerosene under a pressure of 20 atmospheres began. To identify possible defects, boats continuously cruised along the gas line route, from which they monitored the appearance of oil stains on the surface of the water. Careful observations over 72 hours showed that the pipeline did not have any defects and the kerosene, having traveled about 30 kilometers along the pipe, normally entered the receiving warehouse tanks. At the end of the tests, the government commission declared it possible to put the gas pipeline into operation, giving an excellent assessment of the work performed. The underwater artery has come into operation.
In a record short time - 41 days - directly at the front line, during daily bombing and artillery shelling, this underwater welded pipeline was built for the first time in the Union, providing Leningrad with fuel during the most difficult days of the siege.
The gas pipeline operated successfully for 20 months. 400-420 tons of gasoline entered the besieged city every day, passing under the very nose of the enemy.
"Energy breakthrough of the blockade"
Eng. F. VEITKOV
At the end of July 1942, a group of Lenenergo engineers, led by chief engineer Sergei Vasilyevich Usov, developed a bold and courageous plan to help Leningrad with electricity. Engineers Usov, Yezhov and Naumovsky proposed connecting the city with the Volkhov hydroelectric station, saved from the Germans, and receiving electrical energy from it. In those days, the electrical ration of blockaded Leningrad was very meager, and obtaining additional power of at least 10-20 thousand kWh per day was vital.
City power stations could not provide electricity: there was no coal, no peat. The enemy was in control of the regional power plants. The enemy destroyed the Dubrovsk power plant to the ground: the front line passed here for many months. Svirskaya and other hydroelectric power stations were cut off and were located behind enemy lines. At the Volkhov hydroelectric station, work was in full swing to restore two hydrogenerators.
The proposal of Lenenergo engineers was supported by city defense leaders.
On August 7, 1942, the Military Council of the Leningrad Front decided to build a power transmission line from the Volkhov hydroelectric station to Leningrad with a total length of more than 150 kilometers within two months. The middle part of the line was to be made with a cable laid along the bottom of Lake Ladoga. In addition, it was necessary to build three transformer substations.
A new power line had to be built under the nose of the enemy, who was continuously bombing work sites. The line was also unusual because it had to be built in 60 days - four times faster than it was supposed to be done in peacetime. Instead of the previous two lines with a voltage of 110 thousand volts, according to the technical capabilities of that time, it was necessary to transmit electricity from Volkhov along one line with a voltage of 65 thousand volts. It was necessary to lay 22 km of 10-kilovolt cable along the bottom of the lake. The line's builders had no experience in constructing a long power transmission consisting of three pieces: two overhead cables at the ends and a submarine cable in the middle.
To carry out a large volume of complex technical work, it was necessary to have many qualified cable and air handlers. But they were not in the Lenenergo system in those days. Some went to the front, others died or were evacuated.
It was very difficult for the builders and installers of the air sections of the Ladozhskaya line, who worked from the Volkhov and the western Leningrad coast. But the working conditions of the cable workers on Lake Ladoga were many times more difficult and stressful.
They worked only at night, without lighting the lights. Smoking was prohibited. The cable laying was carried out in the dark with a barge on cold autumn nights. To lay 22 km of cable, it was necessary to drag 55 cable coils onto barges, weighing 8-10 tons each. But these 600 tons of cable
made up only one thread, and to skip 15-20 THOUSAND. kW of power, it was necessary to lay 5 threads of cable with a total weight of more than 3 thousand tons. It was necessary to install up to 300 couplings to connect individual pieces of cable to each other, and
first separate the appropriate number of cable ends.
Young people worked valiantly alongside the older workers. Brave Leningrad girls and teenagers, among whom there were many Komsomol members, under the supervision of several experienced craftsmen, did a tremendous job of building the Volkhov-Leningrad line.
On September 23, 1942, a full 13 days ahead of schedule, this unusual power line went into operation.
On that memorable autumn day, the current of the firstborn of our electrification - the Volkhov hydroelectric station named after Lenin - by the will of Leningrad power engineers, broke through the enemy blockade. Along the life-giving artery, heroic Leningrad received electrical energy.
The Volkhov electricity received by the city breathed a new stream of vigor into its valiant defenders.
The energy workers kept a vigilant eye on the new line. They showed a lot of creativity and ingenuity to keep it running reliably. Particular attention was paid to the cable section. Difficult laying conditions and the discrepancy between the quality of the cable and the conditions of its operation (it was necessary to lay a high-quality marine cable, but there was none) sometimes made themselves felt. The onset of winter has further complicated the task of Leningrad power engineers.
Lake Ladoga was covered with a cover of thick ice.
The cable laid along the bottom of the lake now seemed to be walled up. The line's builders were tormented by doubts: “What if a hairline crack appears in one of the many connecting cable couplings and water begins to penetrate into the cable? What if there is a short circuit? How then to detect the damaged area and remove the damaged piece of cable, how to replace the defective coupling resting under a meter layer of ice?
A solution was found. On December 9, 1942, a new decision was made: to build an aerial “ice line” as soon as possible to replace the cable section of the line.
And, despite the fierce winter cold, hard work began again for brave energy workers.
But even now the seasoned installers were surprised by what they were doing. At first it seemed that the laws of electrical engineering, the strength of materials and long-standing installation rules were rejected. And only later, later, did they understand the creative significance of advanced science.
In fact, until this time, installers knew, for example, that power line supports must be installed either on a concrete foundation or in ordinary soil with horizontal support beams and with reliable backfill. Was it proposed to drill holes in the ice here? and freeze short pillars in them - stepsons, to which the legs and traverses of a flat U-shaped support can already be tilted. Ice was used as a reliable foundation.
The installers knew that in each power line, in addition to the usual intermediate supports, anchor supports must be installed every few kilometers. But among the 176 supports to be installed, there was not a single anchor one. They were replaced by conventional supports, reinforced with light steel braces.
The installers knew that the wires must be in special terminals so that the mechanical tension forces on the wires and the load on the supports would be within acceptable limits. Here the wires were placed on the rollers of simple double-ear clamps and secured along the entire line only in a few corner supports.
All this was new and unusual, but quite reliable.
As before, the enemy should not have learned the secrets of the “ice line”. It was necessary to secretly deliver many vehicles with scaffolding for supports to the work sites, it was necessary to transport bulky coils of linear and fastening wires, and finally, it was necessary to manage to build an almost 30-kilometer power transmission line in a short time.
And again the heroic team steadfastly overcame all difficulties. After 15 days, a new section of the line went into operation.
Days passed; and weeks. Everywhere, as if by agreement, tables stubbornly rose
mercury beads of thermometers. The ice of Ladoga, although it was melting, still supported the unusual power line. It is said that this was because the line itself, in turn, held together a large strip of lake ice.
Soon, polynyas appeared. Linemen returning from the line arrived wet to the waist. The reliability of the “ice line” has raised concerns. But the Leningrad power engineers did not waste time and did not sit idly by.
By March 21, 1943, the historical “ice line” on Lake Ladoga was completely dismantled, and a new coastline was already in the works, passing through territory recently cleared of the enemy.
Leningrad and the whole country defeated the Nazi invaders with increasing force.
Years will pass, but never; The glory of the brave power engineers - the builders of the Life Line on Ladoga during the Great Patriotic War - will not fade.
"Directed Communication".
V. MEDVEDEV
The connection between the multimillion-dollar besieged city and the “Great Land,” as Leningraders then called their great homeland, was achieved through many means.
Along with the telephone and telegraph cable laid along the bottom of Lake Ladoga and conventional radio communications, the heroic defenders of the city managed to establish another type of communication, which played a big role in the defense of the city.
We are talking about a directed ultrashort wave line across Lake Ladoga.
In most cases, radio stations send their waves around them in all directions. In military conditions, this often allows the enemy to monitor transmissions, try to decipher them, or disrupt the operation of stations by creating special interference. In this case, ultrashort waves turn out to be very valuable, making it possible to transmit with a narrow directed beam. It is impossible for an enemy to eavesdrop on or interfere with such a transmission unless he is directly in the path of the directed beam.
As you know, the only enemy-free space connecting Leningrad with the country was Lake Ladoga.
A responsible and honorable task fell to the lot of the Leningrad electricians. They were tasked with building the necessary equipment for directed shortwave communications across the lake. This equipment was built under very difficult blockade conditions. The plant did not have all the necessary equipment, since much of it had already been evacuated to the interior of the country. People worked in cold rooms. There was no electricity.
Chief designer of the plant comrade. Spirov, who led this work, was not stopped by any difficulties. From an automobile gas-generating engine and a small dynamo, his own small power plant was built in a very short time. Several machines came to life. Parts were made with numb hands, transmitting and receiving equipment, complex dipole antennas and tall wooden masts The antennas were installed in the forest, not far from the shore, with the help of military units.
Despite all the difficulties, the work was completed successfully. In mid-1942, the first radio signals flew across the lake.
The communication line built between Leningrad and the “Mainland” had another important property. The fact is that a very high radio frequency allows such a line to be used many times. By modulating a high frequency with several lower ones, “multi-channel transmission” can be achieved. Modern communication technology widely uses this method in order to simultaneously transmit several telephone conversations over one line without interfering with each other. Thus, the besieged city, from the moment the directed ultra-short wave communication came into effect, received not one, but several communication channels. The huge city and the Red Army defending it needed many simultaneously operating lines.
The Germans could not interfere with the directional communications by any means. It is possible that for a long time they did not even suspect its existence. Well-camouflaged wooden masts with a row of short copper pipes located at the top were not detected by German aircraft.
Soon, directed shortwave communications were included in the centralized communication system of Leningrad with Moscow and other cities of the Union. She served well and uninterruptedly throughout the war.
Maybe some of the readers had to talk on the phone with Leningrad during its siege. Most likely, this conversation took place precisely through these radio stations, built and installed by Leningraders already during the blockade.
