atomic

Atomic lake in the Ural taiga. • Russia today Posting in CHAT: Russia In the north of the Perm region there is a small lake, lost among the endless sea of ​​green taiga. In appearance, this is an unremarkable body of water measuring approximately 700 by 400 meters with dark blue transparent water. Two things may surprise tourists in this lake. Firstly, it is not fed by any river. And the second one has a strange name. Lake Yadernoe. Agree, it’s unusual... Meanwhile, the lake is part of the history of our country, and specifically of the great communist construction projects of the Labor Five-Year Plans. This is all that remains of the once grandiose project to turn the northern rivers back. And the origin of the reservoir is by no means natural, but mostly man-made - Lake Yadernoye was formed after an underground nuclear explosion carried out here in 1971. Fill the Caspian Few people know about the Taiga project. This was part of a larger project to change nature that the Soviet authorities decided to undertake. In the last article, I talked about the transfer of the Ob and Irtysh runoff to the arid Central Asian steppes and deserts. Now it’s our turn to talk about the fate that was in store for the northern rivers – the Pechora and Northern Dvina. At the end of the 60s, the level of the Caspian Sea began to drop sharply. The water flowed out quickly, and the consequences were obvious literally before our eyes. Where there used to be piers and coastal structures, a sand and clay desert has formed. Hydrologists associated this with a decrease in the flow of the Volga, the main feeding artery of the Caspian Sea. To expand it, the idea arose to fill the Volga bed with water from neighboring, unconnected rivers. The Northern Dvina and Pechora turned out to be ideal candidates. A project of canals was developed that were supposed to connect the Pechora and Kama canals. It was planned to build not only a canal system, but also several reservoirs and cascades of hydroelectric power stations. The volume of work was enormous and digging everything with the help of technology was extremely irrational and expensive. In transferring the northern rivers to the Volga basin, it was necessary to involve not only the Pechora River, but also the Northern Dvina. Project "Taiga" And then nuclear scientists came to the rescue. Scientists from the Institute of Atomic Energy named after. Kurchatov was asked to conduct an experiment connecting Lake Chusovskoye in the Perm region with the upper reaches of the Kama using directed underground nuclear explosions. The distance there was a little more than 70 kilometers and, according to the plan proposed by the nuclear scientists, it was necessary to carry out 250 (!) nuclear explosions in order to form a deep and wide artificial canal. You must understand that this was nothing more. than an experiment. The river diversion project itself was only being developed on paper at that time, designers were drawing the beds of future man-made waterways, and nuclear scientists were already ready to demonstrate in practice the full power of the peaceful atom at the construction site of communism. . Of course, no one is going to detonate all 250 charges at once; three was enough for the experiment. The experiment received permission from the very top, and the project was given the code name “Taiga”. If successful, it was planned to extend the experience not only to the project of transferring the flow of northern rivers into the Volga basin, but also to the construction of a larger-scale Ob-Central Asia canal, which I told you about earlier. explosions. Three Hiroshimas And at the end of 1970, work began to boil. In the Cherdinsky district of the Perm Territory, in a dense forest near the village of Vasyukovo, three 120-meter shafts were dug, connected by a labyrinth of thick electrical cables. They were loaded with payloads of 15 kilotons each (the same power was the Malyutka bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945). Hour X came on March 23, 1971. The spring taiga of the Ural taiga was shaken by a powerful nuclear explosion. The “mushroom” from it was seen by the village residents, who for some reason were not relocated, but were only ordered to leave their homes during the explosion. Eyewitnesses later said that they saw a bright fire and felt the ground tremble under their feet. The moment of the explosion from the direction of the village of Vasyukovo. The experiment was a great success. As a result of a massive ejection of soil (the height of the column reached 300 meters), a huge crater formed in the taiga, which a year later was completely filled with water. Officially, the explosions were recognized as successful, but there was no further continuation. Glavexpertiza specialists had many questions about the project itself of filling the Volga bed with Pechora waters - there were too many gaps and gaps in it. Moreover, when this survey was carried out (1983), the Caspian Sea had been steadily increasing in volume for several years and not a trace remained of the previous shallowing. The project to “turn over” the northern rivers was finally closed, but the Sibirskaya received a positive assessment. Taiga Pearl But they no longer decided to use nuclear explosions in the construction of the canal, despite significant financial savings. The fact is that after three explosions in the Perm taiga, a radioactive trail 25 kilometers long was formed, and toxic dust was found even in Sweden. What would happen if 200 such explosions were carried out? Yes, on the scale not of the north of the Urals, but of Western Siberia, where this figure must be multiplied by another 10? In general, they decided to abandon the use of peaceful atoms in the construction of canals. 51 years have passed. Now there is nothing left of the fence, and the man-made lake itself, which has since received the name “Atomic”, is no different from similar reservoirs. Clean calm water, a lot of fish and normal background radiation. There are no excursions to it - local authorities still classify Yadernoe as a dangerous zone, but you can get to the lake, albeit accompanied by an experienced guide who knows taiga roads and knows how to move through swampy swamps. And when you get there, admire the dark blue surface of the reservoir, which appeared here at the whim of man, and think about what environmental disaster we avoided. These are new signs. Old tourists picked it up for souvenirs. The Pechora-Kama Canal was never built. And this is correct, especially considering the methods used to excavate it. But they not only built another canal connecting the Ob and Yenisei, but even tried to exploit it. But nothing good came of it. Source link Source link