Online reading of the book Campaign "Chelyuskin" Surveyor J. Gakkel

Thick fog. Blindly, groping, the Chelyuskin moves at the slowest speed, constantly changing course, all the while skirting the ice floes. All day August 23 - ice. Either cohesive up to eight points, then sparse up to three points.

Choosing the most convenient path, the Chelyuskin slowly makes its way to the northeast. It is already difficult for the navigator to navigate the ship in the ice, and then the fog covers the distance. But time is precious, and the most difficult is yet to come. You need to go ahead.

The immediate task of the expedition is to find approaches to the Severozemelsky straits leading from the Kara Sea to the Laptev Sea. All attention is absorbed by the execution of this task.

At nine o'clock in the evening, a lot thrown into the sea unexpectedly announced the danger. Suspiciously shallow depth: only 14 1/2 meters. What's the matter? There is no hint of shallow water in the area on the map…

Immediately stopping the car, "Chelyuskin" repeated the sounding. No mistake: 14 1/2 meters! The ship began to move away from danger, measuring the depth every 10 minutes. In such cases, at sea, caution comes first. And you will not notice how it ran aground!

At 11 o'clock, at a depth of 16 meters, it was decided to anchor and wait for the weather to clear up.

Night. In addition to the watchmen, several more people do not sleep: they monitor drifting ice, currents, and the weather. In the exchange of various kinds of assumptions about the mysterious shallows, the night passes unnoticed.

At five o'clock in the morning, when the fog began to dissipate, the vague outlines of land appeared to the left. Earth? But what? There is no sign of her on the map...

We quickly try to sketch the outlines on paper. Soon everyone on the ship already knows about the appearance of a new island.

At six o'clock the captain ordered to weigh anchor in order to approach the island as close as possible, as far as the depth and ice would allow. We stopped 2 1/2 miles from mysterious island. His outlines became clearer and clearer. Immediately, preparations began for the launching of two iceboats, specially adapted for navigation among the ice. Wishing to get on unknown island It turned out, of course, much more than ice cubes can accommodate. There are only 16 places in them, and Otto Yulievich inexorably draws up a list of sixteen, which first of all includes the scientific staff of the expedition.

The collection of the necessary tools is quickly going on, we have breakfast in a hurry, and now the boats are lowered into the harbor. One by one they went to the island, accompanied by the envious glances of all who hoped to get into such a tempting journey.

Otto Yulievich, standing on the prow of the boat, with a long hook, deftly pushed away any piece of ice that threatened to scratch the side of the brand new piece of ice. Tacking in the leads, among the heavy drifting ice, carefully watching so as not to be in a dead end or in a trap, our boats quickly moved forward, sometimes losing sight of each other among the blocks of ice. Even to those who are accustomed to the ice, they seemed much more impressive today from the boat than usual.

Bright, sunny weather gave an unforgettable beauty to the bizarre landscape.

Two hours later we approached the edge of the fixed fast ice. Having climbed onto the ropaki, we chose the path that could be taken in boats to the island itself. Having pushed into the water the already pulled out ice cubes, we headed to the shore.

After 15 minutes, driven by the second ice rink, the “team” of which tried in vain to overtake us, we reached the goal. A few more minutes, and the unloaded tool has already been raised to a high, almost sheer bank. Just as quickly install and adjust the tools. They are ready to watch! We have to determine the geographical location of the island by the sun. The sun has already passed the meridian. We missed the most favorable moment for determining the latitude. Without losing a single minute, I make counts. The physicist Fakidov is right there: he makes magnetic observations.

How long does it take you to determine an astronomical point? - asks me Otto Yulievich.

Perhaps I’ll finish by four o’clock, I guess, looking at the chronometer.

Having agreed to meet at four o'clock, everyone dispersed in different directions. P. K. Khmyznikov climbed along the exposed steep western coast, studying the geological structure of the island and collecting a collection of rocks. P. P. Shirshov went to collect a herbarium of a few species of lichens, which represent the meager vegetation cover of the island. V. S. Stakhanov, armed with a gun and binoculars, went in search of "local representatives of the fauna."

All the rest, divided into groups at the direction of Otto Yulievich Schmidt, dispersed around the island with one goal: to find some traces of a person being here. It would be especially interesting to find a sign or the remains of a sign that Sverdrup placed on the island of Solitude in 1915. This find would immediately resolve all doubts about the unknown island.

Fakidov and I, having completed the first series of observations, took advantage of the free time and went to the eastern part of the island in order to briefly familiarize ourselves with it.

Our astronomical station was located on the steep western bank. Having passed through several valleys with gentle slopes and frozen stream beds with the remnants of snow on the bottom, we soon came to the eastern slope. Farther to the east lay a vast, flooded, low-lying part of the island, bordered by sandy spits. These spits converged together, forming a cape - the eastern tip of the island. From the northern and southern sides, near the indigenous, high part of the island, lagoons covered with ice stood out.

Having made a sketch of the eastern half of the island with a gentler slope than on the western coast, we hurried back to complete the astronomical observations.

Returning to the instruments, near which most of the tourists have already gathered, I proceed to determine the longitude.

Amazing day! The sun, which used to be so stingy in allowing us to observe it, does not hide for a minute today. And while I am finishing my observations, fast, energetic work is going on next to me. The comrades are constructing the houris - a sign marking the place of astronomical and magnetic definitions. Stones are laid out one by one. The pyramid is growing. It is encircled by a circle made of the same stones. Inside the pyramid is a bottle with notes enclosed in it.

Perhaps someday another expedition will set foot on this land, and notes taken from a simple glass bottle will tell about the Chelyuskin campaign. They will tell about the goals of the expedition, provide information about the astronomical point on this deserted piece of land and the names of the tourists.

Having done everything that could be done in 4 1/2 hours of being on the island, we went "home" - on the steamer.

Our boat, as before, tacked between drifting ice floes, choosing the safest path. But this time was not without adventure. Halfway through, we quietly fell into a treacherous trap. The boat calmly walked along the channel between the ice floes, when suddenly our channel began to narrow rapidly: somewhere off to the side, the drifting ice ran into a stamukha - an ice floe that was sitting aground - and giant white blocks began to close. There is not a second to lose: the boat is in danger of being crushed by the ice.

We instantly jump out onto one of the ice floes and pull out the boat behind us. The glorious glacier once again clearly proved its merits to us. Its sloping, sloping stem and sternpost, its side skids - keels allow you to quickly pull a light boat out of the water and drag it along the ice. That's how we do it. Dragging the boat across dangerous place, we calmly lower it into the water from the opposite edge of the ice floe and, without any incidents, an hour later we reach the Chelyuskin.

Our companions on another boat, which we had lost sight of, were in the same mess.

But even there everything went well. With cheerful songs, the crew of the second boat joined our "flagship".

At nine o'clock in the evening, together with the "Sedov" that approached us, the "Chelyuskin" weighed anchor and went east to clear water. Sedov was running out of coal. We were going to give him the necessary "loan". An hour and a quarter later, the ships dropped anchor and moored to each other for bunkering. But drifting ice approached. The ships began to breed. Having weighed anchor, Chelyuskin and Sedov again retreated to clear water in order to continue reloading.

On the same day, an airplane engine rumbled over the icy silence. It was Otto Yulievich, together with Babushkin, who undertook a flight over the island in order to photograph it from the air and make sketches. They returned, and our Sh-2 amphibian took to the air again. Babushkin and Captain Voronin went on a deep reconnaissance of the ice. Heading east, to the area where the island of Solitude was previously listed on the map. An hour and a half later they returned - there is no land in that area ...

Thus, valuable material was obtained, which made it possible to draw up a plan for the island of Solitude, accurately map it and draw up a description of its nature.

A slight delay of "Chelyuskin" more than justified itself.

The geographical position of the island, in the very center of the Kara Sea, is very favorable for the construction of an extremely important radio and air weather station here. In the straits leading from the Barents Sea to the Kara Sea and from the Kara Sea to the Laptev Sea (as well as on the coast of the mainland), we already have a number of stations that illuminate the navigation conditions in the Kara Sea. But the central part of the sea - the regime of ice, navigational conditions - can be studied and illuminated only when a station is created on the island of Solitude.

Only one question of purely geographical interest remained unclear. There has been a lot of controversy around him. They argued immediately after the Chelyuskinites visited the island. We also argued later, when during the winter we processed the materials related to this excursion.

The Island of Solitude was the name of the land discovered in 1878 by the Norwegian industrialist Johansen. After the discovery, only one ship visited the island - the Eclipse (now Lomonosov) under the command of Captain O. Sverdrup. "Eclipse" in 1915 was sent by the tsarist government to search for the missing expeditions of Brusilov and Rusanov. Since then, no one has seen this island again. Passed here "Sedov" in 1930. Passed in 1932 "Sibiryakov" and "Rusanov" and did not find any land. This gave reason to believe that the geographical position the islands are not what he had hitherto occupied on the maps, and there was nothing surprising in this. After all, Johansen determined the position of the island astronomically - only in longitude, and even then not very accurately. There was no radio then, and time was checked only by chronometers. The geographical latitude of the island has not been determined at all. And Sverdrup could not astronomically determine the location of the island at all. And it is not surprising that subsequently, passing in this place, not a single ship found the “missing land”.

But the same "Sedov" in 1930, heading for Severnaya Zemlya, stumbled upon some new island. It was located 25 miles southeast of where Solitude Island was marked on the maps.

Foggy weather and lack of time prevented the ship from being delayed to explore the open island. And by calling new land in the name of one of the participants in the voyage - Isachenko Island, "Sedov", without stopping, went to the northeast. He went to new discoveries, which he repeatedly had to make in this voyage. And this voyage was already marked by the sensational discovery of Wiese Island, which Professor Wiese himself brilliantly predicted on the basis of theoretical conclusions a few years before.

After the voyage of the Sibiryakov and Rusanov in 1932, the position of the "disputed" island was called into question. Then it was suggested that the island of Isachenko is the same island that Johansen discovered under the name of Solitude. This affected nautical charts published in 1933. A note was placed near the island of Solitude: "the situation is doubtful", and next to the island of Isachenko: "the existence is doubtful."

After our visit to the island - despite its similarity in some features to the way Johansen and Dr. Trzemessky (a member of the Sverdrup expedition) describe it - we still seem to need to remember these notes on the map. Remember until Isachenko Island is explored. Indeed! If the island visited by the Chelyuskinites is a “real” Solitude, then how did Captain Sverdrup find Solitude when he was looking for the Rusanov Expedition there? After all, he did not accidentally stumble upon the island. He went there, having a specific task - to find, examine, since it was assumed that the Rusanov expedition had left some traces there. If Sverdrup had visited the island visited by the Chelyuskinites, then undoubtedly we would have learned from Sverdrup that this island lies not at all where Johansen noted it. In addition to the sign (or its remains), which Sverdrup left, the Chelyuskinites did not find it. Most likely, Sverdrup could not even find this island, because it is 50 miles away from the "old" Solitude. Most likely, Sverdrup was on the island of Isachenko, located only 25 miles from the "former" Solitude. That is, in other words, the island of Isachenko and the island of Solitude (Johansen) are one and the same land.

What the study of Isachenko Island will show is a matter of the near future. In the meantime, without affirming our considerations in a categorical form, we have to leave the former Question Mark near the island of Solitude.

Many more surprises await Soviet navigators and explorers in the Arctic!

In 1878, the Norwegian navigator Edvar Johannessen discovered the island while fishing on the Nordland hunting schooner. The discovery was named Solitude, since a piece of land with an area of ​​​​20 square kilometers was located far from any land, in the very center of the Kara Sea, between Novaya Zemlya, Taimyr and Severnaya Zemlya. Bad weather prevented the Norwegian from correctly setting the coordinates of Solitude, and for almost 40 years its location remained uncertain.

In 1915, the Eclipse barque approached the island under the command of another native of Norway, Otto Sverdrup. The Russian government hired him to search for and rescue the expeditions of Sedov, Rusanov and Brusilov, one after another missing in these latitudes. Unfortunately, the Norwegian did not save the Russian polar explorers, but he again discovered the island. Sverdrup definitely knew a lot about geography - islands in the Kara Sea, in the Lincoln Sea and even a whole strait in the north of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago bear his name. But even he could not correctly determine the coordinates of Solitude. The weather failed again.

"Chelyuskin" puts an end to it. On the map

The vague data obtained by the Norwegians did not allow finding the island again. In 1930, another object was found nearby - Isachenko Island, and some geographers were inclined to believe that Isachenko is the missing Solitude. Doubts were dispelled by the legendary Soviet steamer "Chelyuskin", which in 1933, following from Murmansk to Vladivostok, accidentally discovered the lost island.

Here is how the expedition member, famous Soviet oceanographer Yakov Gakkel describes this event. "Night. In addition to the watchmen, several more people do not sleep: they monitor drifting ice, currents, and the weather. In the exchange of various kinds of assumptions about the mysterious shallows, the night passes unnoticed. At five o'clock in the morning, when the fog began to dissipate, the vague outlines of land appeared to the left. Earth? But what? There is no sign of it on the map ... We quickly try to sketch the outlines on paper. Soon everyone on the ship already knows about the appearance of a new island. At six o'clock the captain ordered to weigh anchor in order to approach the island as close as possible, as far as the depth and ice would allow. We stopped 2 1/2 miles from the mysterious island. His outlines became clearer and clearer. Immediately, preparations began for the launching of two iceboats, specially adapted for navigation among the ice. Of course, there were many more people wishing to get to the unknown island than the ice-boxes could accommodate. There are only 16 seats in them ... The necessary tools are quickly collected, we have breakfast in a hurry, and now the boats are lowered to the draw ... One by one they headed for the island, accompanied by the envious glances of everyone who hoped to get on such a tempting journey.

In just five hours of parking, Chelyuskin managed not only to determine the exact coordinates of the island, but also to survey the area and carry out other important studies. Finally geographical feature has been mapped! In just a year, a polar station will be opened here, which will work until 1996.

U-251 attacks polar explorers

During World War II, the lonely island was attacked by a German submarine. During Operation Wunderland, the German fleet tried to cut off allied supplies via the Northern Sea Route. And since a Soviet radio station worked on the island, it also fell into the number of objects under attack.

On the night of September 8, 1942, the submarine U-251, in accordance with the order received the day before, made the transition to Cape Desire. Along the way, Lieutenant Commander Timm made the decision to destroy important facilities on the island. The boat approached him in a submerged position. Having surfaced, U-251 opened artillery fire on the polar station from a distance of 3500-4000 meters. The shelling lasted 25 minutes and, according to the German commander, was quite effective.

According to later clarified data, as a result of the shelling, three shells hit a residential building, four into the radio station building and one into a pigsty. Nevertheless, the main equipment of the radio station was not damaged, and the polar explorers were able to report the attack and its consequences to the headquarters of naval operations. There were no casualties or wounded among the personnel. The only victims were two pigs, who received shrapnel wounds.

New life

In peacetime, the work of the polar station continued. But in the mid-1990s, it was closed: the collapse of the USSR led to the curtailment of scientific and military activities throughout the Arctic. At that time, not only stations, but also entire villages were evacuated from the Russian North. Today the situation is clearly changing for the better.

New programs for the development of the Russian Arctic give the lost island an opportunity for rebirth. The first harbinger of change was the appearance here of a new meteorological station installed by the Rosneft company. The station, according to experts, meets the most modern requirements for such equipment. With its installation, Rosneft Oil Company completely closed the meteorological observation system in the Kara Sea.

Recently, the area of ​​the Kara Sea has acquired strategic importance. As you know, in the fall, Russian oilmen successfully completed drilling of the world's northernmost Arctic well, and as a result, the Pobeda field was discovered. For the first time in 50 years, a new offshore province has been discovered, surpassing, according to experts, such oil and gas bearing areas as the Gulf of Mexico, the Brazilian shelf, the Arctic shelf of Alaska and Canada.

The development of new offshore fields requires more accurate and complete meteorological data. To this end, Rosneft has developed and is successfully implementing a special program for the complete restoration of the meteorological observation system in the Arctic. Modern stations have already appeared on Preobrazheniya Island in the Laptev Sea and on Zhokhov Island in the East Siberian Sea.

The unified meteorological observation network will not only optimize the work of geological exploration and increase the efficiency of mining, but will also launch a series of large-scale scientific and research programs to study the region. And the island of Solitude will play an important role in this.

an island in the central part of the Kara Sea (USSR). Area about 20 km 2. Height 20-25 m. It is composed mainly of loose sandy deposits. Tundra vegetation. Discovered and named in 1878 by the Norwegian captain E. Johannesen. Since 1934 there has been a polar station on the island.

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